Time for India to get on the front foot

Anand Vasu

February 19, 2001

In every war movie, book or mythological story the first thing rulers are rumoured to do, is get on the highest balcony, address a gathering of teeming masses and cry out "People unite!" War or not, that is the approximate slogan doing the rounds these days. The mighty Australians are here and India is quaking in her very boots. One thing was certain long before the men from Down Under landed on Indian soil. There would be very few people involved in cricket or interested in cricket who could afford to be indifferent to the series and indeed events surrounding it.

Steve Waugh fired the first salvo in the media long before their arrival in India. Sourav Ganguly countered it with his own words. After a few scrummy exchanges, Ganguly decided to call it quits and declared "I've already said enough about the Australians." That certainly is a start. It's one thing for school children to resort to abuse and backchat when dealing with a bully. For Ganguly to get entangled in something as futile as a slanging match through the media was unfortunate to say the least.

QUESTION:

get on the front foot = take the first step?

Another example using 'get on the front foot'. Does 'getting on the front foot' mean 'attacking'?

They pose a challenge to the industry to be better at innovating, getting on the front foot, not relying on an external rule-book but putting itself in control of situation-specific processes, developments and opportunities.