It was March 2001. India was to play Australia in a test match at the Eden Gardens. The cricket fanatic that I was needed no better fodder than what happened on five days, from the eleventh to the fifteenth of that month. Undoubtedly, the test match would go down as one of the best ever India played in the annals of test cricket’s history. No doubt it would find mention in the folklore of Indian cricket. It reiterated the fact that I was blessed to be a part of a generation who could watch cricket greats like Rahul Dravid bat.
The essence of the test match and how the teams played could be done if we analyse it day by day. So, here it goes, the saga that took place between India and Australia and the spectators at the Eden Gardens are a witness to that.
Day 1: I had switched on the television just moments before the toss. As the two captains, Steve Waugh and Sourav Ganguly, were ready for the toss, I too settled down on the easy chair to spend the rest of the day glued to the television. Australia had the first laugh, winning the toss and electing to bat first. It inadvertently meant India has to play the fourth innings, which on any track is a tough job.
Out came the two Australian openers, Micheal Slater and Matthew Hayden. The sooner this partnership is broken, the better, I mused.
That was not to be. They played and kept on playing. No doubt they were the invincible; no doubt they had won a record sixteen test matches in a row. The openers showed the class of the Australian team. At the end of two sessions, I was miserable for the scoreboard read 193/1. The Indian bowlers were sent on a leather hunt.
During the tea break, I contemplated switching off the television, for there was no use for an Indian fan watching what was obvious, an Australian romp. But what else should I do? My exams were over; the only way to pass time was to be associated with cricket.
With no other option, I watched Hayden and Langer coming out to bat, more specifically, to torment the Indians in the final session of the day.
I don’t know how it happened for what followed was something so dramatic that I have never seen it in any of the test matches or one day cricket. Harbhajan Singh, the man with the golden arm, ripped apart the famed Australian batting line-up to leave them wobbling at 291/8. The mighty Australian team had lost seven wickets for a meagre 91 runs in the final session of the day. At last I could get some night’s sleep, I felt.
Day 2: I was all set for the match to begin. At last, the Australians had succumbed to the Indians, with Harbhajan leading the way. It was just a matter of time before the Australian tail would be polished off, or so I thought.
But what happened was jaw dropping. Steve Waugh was on a rampage with Jason Gillespie giving company and took the score to 402/8, at last when Gillespie fell. But McGrath gave able company to Waugh to take the Australian score to 445. A total of 176 runs had been added in one and a half sessions before the tail perished. I was stunned. What followed made me skip my dinner, for the famed Indian batting line-up crumbled to 128/8 before the stumps were drawn for the day. India needed 118 runs to avoid following-on, with only VVS Laxman as the recognized batsman at the crease.
In all probabilities, win number 17 was on cards for the Australians. The Indian team simply had squandered the advantage they had gained on day 1. More so, the Australians had wrested back the advantage from the Indians.
Day 3: The Indian tail wagged, or should I not say that? From the overnight score of 128/8, the Indians managed to reduce the deficit by 58 runs, with Laxman stroking 59 important runs. Nevertheless, Indians had 274 runs in deficit. It meant that the Indians will not play the fourth innings, but will have to bat again. Waugh had imposed follow-on.
This time the openers showed resolve. They batted better than how they did the previous day, putting up a half century opening partnership. When Sadagopan Ramesh was dismissed, Laxman came one down. I heaved a sigh of relief. Here came a man who was in good touch. With Shiv Sundar Das and Sachin Tendulakar following Ramesh to the pavilion, Laxman and Ganguly were in the damage control mode, putting up a century partnership. The woefully out of form Dravid took the place of his captain and helped Laxman complete his century. When the stumps were drawn, I had something to cheer about- the resilience of Laxman and innings defeat was most probably out of question, with the deficit only 20 runs.
However, win number 17 loomed large for the Australians. The Indian tigers were to be humbled in their own soil. No denying that.
Day 4: This was perhaps a dream I was seeing. How often would one see days like these, especially when Indians were batting?
I was happy when the deficit was indeed cleared. At last, the Oz have to come out to bat. I was elated to see The Wall back in form, scoring a patient fifty. But what followed was something divine. A performance that I think I would never see but once.
Laxman and Dravid forged a partnership of epic proportions. They batted out the whole day without even a single wicket down and the lead worth 315. For the first time in that match, I felt why the stumps were drawn. India had reached 589/4 with Laxman on a mammoth 279 and Dravid beyond the century mark. What if this continued for eternity? A draw was on the cards that is if Indians don’t crumble the next day.
Day 5: With the last day of the test coming up, I was happy that at least the Indians had stretched the match to five days. This was not a case of abject surrender, as it looked a couple of days ago.
The Indians batted in the batting paradise, and reached 657/7 when Ganguly declared the innings. Laxman had missed triple century by 19 runs and Dravid had missed his double century by 20 runs. But they had contributed to the team, pulled them out of precarious situation Indians had found themselves in.
The net result was this: off the remaining 75 overs, the Australians had to score 384 runs for their 17th win on a trot, a near impossibility.
With Hayden, Slater and Waugh looking solid, draw was the only possibility. They had reached 166/3 in the 45 overs bowled so far. The remaining 30 overs would have been of no interest of course, until the man with the golden arm returned into the scene.
Harbhajan Singh and Sachin Tendulkar had spun a web on the Australian batting line-up. The Australians who so far looked like the invincible, were set for abject surrender due to an unprecedented batting collapse with Harbhajan, the wrecker-in-chief.
The outcome of the match was one which I thought was a near impossibility, an Indian victory that too by a margin of 171 runs. This was only a third case in history of test cricket that a team forced to follow on had gone on to win the game, the commenter was saying. This was the first time India had achieved the feat.
I shouted out loud:
“Mera Bharat Mahaan”