Feb 25, 2002 09:38 AM
5260 Views
(Updated Feb 25, 2002 09:38 AM)
The pommies came to India and left after a grueling series comprising 3 tests and 6 one day matches spread across nearly 3 months. Our team has always been touted as “Sher Khans” at home but that epithet too is now becoming increasingly suspect on the back of half-hearted and barely successful efforts by our star team to beat a second rate English team convincingly at home. The last time the Englishmen visited us for a test series in 1993, we gave them a sound thrashing (3-0) and that was a team comprising some of the best players to have ever played for England. While visions of a similar thrashing were conjured up by the media and to some extent by our own foolish and misplaced confidence in our team, the series proved the Englishmen to be just more than a hurriedly selected outfit.
Playing in alien conditions can be a very challenging and daunting task indeed for most other “Firangi” teams. For one thing, the climate is drastically different from what it normally is say, in Australia or England, the pitches are veritable “Dustbowls” and the tremendous crowd support for the home team, especially in large stadiums like the Eden Gardens at Kolkata can unnerve most visiting sides.
To their credit, the English team performed quite creditably in the recently concluded series by losing only one test and squaring the one day series in a humdinger of a final at the Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai. Off the field, the poms have always been known to complain about a hundred odd factors ranging from the hotel accommodation to the match practice facilities and from the highly spicy food to mosquitoes. They were not found lacking on that front this time around too, perennially complaining as they were about the lack of practice facilities, doubtful umpiring decisions and the additional one day match inserted into the schedule at the insistence of the BCCI.
When Sunil Gavaskar took them to task in his column in one of the news dailies calling them “Master Whiners”, they had the cheek to complain to big papa – The ICC which is nothing but an ant-hill of British colonialists. Being professionals, are they not supposed to adjust to the demanding conditions wherever they tour and concentrate on their task of playing well instead of being cry babies? Did our team ever complain about the weather in England even when the whole world knows that there is only either rain or snowfall there? On every tour of England, our players are often seen trussed up like turkeys with atleast 2 sweatshirts beneath their T-shirts and not less than 3 sweaters on top apart from a Thermo-sweater in between? When our team can play in chilly conditions that could freeze the balls of a brass monkey, why can’t these guys adjust to playing in our conditions?
Coming to the on-field action, they certainly put up some spirited performances in all departments of the game. Even though they were lacking in terms of experience, they were certainly not found wanting when it came to fighting tooth and nail for a win. Inspite of that, our team could still have won atleast one other test and the ODI series with a convincing margin of 5-1 instead of squaring it 3-3. I would not be much off the mark in saying that more than the poms squaring the ODI series, we lost it.
Full marks to their captain, Nasser Hussain, for marshalling his limited resources wonderfully well and beating Ganguly on the tactics front. He seemed to have done his homework well before the series commenced, specifically with reference to having a separate gameplan to get rid of each of the big guns of the Indian batting mainstay. Apart from Sachin and to some extent Sehwag, the rest of the team fell meekly to the guiles of the Englishmen without putting up any semblance of a fight. The visitors were bang on target in pin-pointing the one factor that is a sure-fire solution against India – Pressure. Hussain and co. were saved a lot of trouble as they did not have to try too hard to exert pressure on India. We’ve slowly but surely mastered the art of exerting pressure on ourselves to such an extent that we lose matches which require us to score about 100-120 runs in the final 15-20 overs with 8 players still to make an appearance with their batting paraphernalia on the field. We did that in this series not once but twice in a row. Quite an achievement that...just goes on to prove that we are extremely good learners. I won’t be too surprised if we manage to repeat that feat against Zimbabwe too.
The series was not without its quota of controversies on the part of the Englishmen. Excessive appealing, needless sledging, showing dissent over umpiring decisions, negative tactics (bowling on the legside). They did just about everything under the sun and our adventurous Indiana Joneses responded brilliantly by succumbing to these acts without a demur. In the ultimate analysis, England emerged from this series as a winner and No, I’m talking on the basis of the final scoreline which is only a quantitative indicator. Nasser Hussain’s motley crew of inexperienced cadets learnt and visibly improved their performances with every match on the tour. They were extremely focussed on the task at hand, refused to be cowed down by the awesome but highly questionable reputation of our stars, exhibited an indomitable never-say-die attitude and came out stronger and more confident at the end of the series. The very fact that they lost the test series 0-1 as compared to the much stronger Australian side which lost 1-2 speaks volumes of the application and determination with which they played.
As for my recommending the England team and giving it 3 stars, it’s purely on the basis of their performance in the recently concluded series in India. Our team would do well to learn a thing or two from them when it comes to playing on “away” tours if they want to improve their pathetic record.
