The dashing cricketer will now be pitched as a senior and responsible member of the Indian cricket team.
With his recent cracking good form, Virender Sehwag is ready for a second innings in the world of endorsements – this time as a senior and responsible member of the Indian cricket team.
“The problem till now was that he wasn't one of the younger players and neither was he one of the senior most like Sachin Tendulkar or Saurav Ganguly,” says his manager and Collage Sports Director Latika Khaneja, adding: “While the younger players are lapped up by advertisers, there is place for only one or two senior players.”
The slot for senior players, at the moment, seems open. Rahul Dravid, VVS Laxman and Ganguly have all hit a rough patch in their careers. Injuries are showing up with alarming regularity for Tendulkar. And Kumble is closing in on 40. That leaves the field wide open for Sehwag.
With his recent high-scoring performances in Pakistan and now Sri Lanka, the task may just become that much easier for Khaneja. “As opposed to glamour, stability, maturity and credibility will be the watch words in the story boards,” says Khaneja.
To be sure, Sehwag never had a romantic, glamorous and sophisticated image. He was always seen as an earthy boy from Nazafgarh in the outskirts of Delhi, who let his bat do all the talking. He was an inspiration for small-town achievers and was portrayed as one.
Thus, instead of pairing Bollywood actress Mahima Chaudhary and Sehwag as a couple in a Mayur Suitings ad, they were shown as strangers whose bags get exchanged and what follows is a race to claim their rightful property. “Pairing them romantically won’t have worked,” admits Khaneja.
In the past, Sehwag has been a brand ambassador for homegrown FMCG firm Dabur India. But he was dropped after a short season on account of his poor performance with the bat and premature hair loss. He was also signed on for a while by Reliance Communications – Sehwag’s call to his mother after hitting the winning run had become the butt of several jokes.
So, what can Sehwag endorse now? At present, Collage is looking at further association with his current line-up of brands, which includes Pepsi, Hero Honda, Adidas, Sahara, Boost and Sony Max. It is hopeful that there will be other brands as well which will be keen to sign on the dashing cricketer. “If Sehwag’s excellence as a cricketer goes with a product ideology, we will explore that option,” says Khaneja.
A mature Sehwag was recently seen in a music video-cum-ad of Hero Honda, India’s largest two-wheeler company. To mark its 25th year, Hero Honda recently brought both Bollywood and sports together featuring the likes of Hrithik Roshan and Priyanka Chopra along with cricketers Sehwag, Irfan Pathan, Suresh Raina, Gautam Gambhir and Ishant Sharma as well as ace shooter and 2004 Athens Olympics silver medalist Rajyavardhan Rathore.
But even as Khaneja readies for the new challenge, there are lessons from the past where a second coming did not work. “It didn’t work for Saurav,” says Harish Bijoor, brand specialist and CEO of Harish Bijoor Consults Inc, adding: “Brands want either real achievers or people who can monetise eyeballs. Sehwag is one player who has been optimally utilised by brands in the past and there seems to be a significant residue left from that.”
There are yet others who still don’t find Sehwag as the right replacement for the ageing superstars. “Given his long bad patch in the past, it is difficult to see him as the number one player.A company would rather invest in a young player who is performing well and may turn out to be a significant opportunity in the future,” says another industry expert.
There lies the challenge for Khaneja and Sehwag. In the last few years, several exciting young cricketers have burst on the national scene – Yuvraj Singh, Mahendra Singh Dhoni and Ishant Sharma, to name a few. At the moment, they seem to have more cricket and endorsement life in them than Sehwag. The series with Australia next month could be the acid test for Sehwag.
