Cricketpedia

I was one of those fortunate guys to live in the same place same street from my birth till the time I got a job ( close to a quarter century). Early seventies was a time for baby boomers and we ended up with enough kids in our age group ( + or – 3), thanks to our parents, to have two cricket teams. And there were till a few left for umpiring and other such chores as fielding at long stop or pick the ball hit into the paddy fields. 

With so many folks, on weekends and holidays, around 3.00 Pm or 3.30 PM ( depending on how soon the parents and other elders take their siesta), heads will pop out of homes. Just imagine the Meerkats popping their head out in the show Meerkat manor. For the boys, it was from their homes and that was the only difference. Once we had enough numbers to play (as individuals or as teams), we will saunter towards a grove or to a play ground.

And in all the time spent playing cricket , we  played cricket in different versions/flavors, starting from underarm cricket with rubber ball to proper cricket with cricket ball on matting wickets.

Rubber/Tennis ball cricket: For us this was the simplest version of the game and where we all started. A proper bat was very rare, unless someone was rich enough to buy or lucky to be gifted one. Bat was usually carved out of a plank of wood and invariably played in the streets. Rules varied from being declared out if hit on legs three times or if the ball is hit into some one’s house. Stump was usually a board at the strikers end and at the non striker’s it was usually our slipper of us, the players. We used to pool in money ( 5 paise to 25 paise each) and buy a rubber ball for 2 rupees. Depending on our luck the ball will last one evening or will just a few over.

I remember an incident where one Sunday evening, we all gathered together, pooled in the precious resource and purchased a rubber ball with great fanfare only to see the break in the first over first ball itself. Needless to say, we were heartbroken and put in the best of our efforts to see if we can mobilize more resources to purchase another ball. After much brain storming, we gave up in the fading light and returned home hungry for gaaji  (காஜி). For those of you worrying why we never used a covering ball or tennis ball, it was beyond our means during school days.

There was another time when we desperately needed stumps and in the best of my finite wisdom ( along with my brother and another friend) decided ( being the older one helps) that drumstick tree was the best one for stumps. The stumps didn’t even last one over and we were educated on the use of a drumstick tree even before bhagyaraj gave some lessons.

The morning after when MGR passed away,  i remember observing silence for a minute in the ground before we started the days play.

I won’t forget  bowling mindlessly at the stumps drawn on the wall, for more than two hours  after that last ball six.

Cricket played with corn cob and school exam pad. Corn cobs dropped by people once they are done with the corn, was the ball. This along with the pad used for writing exams aka exam pad made an excellent ball and bat. This was popular during exam times . Again this was more of a limited over match where you had to run for your runs.  This was played in class rooms,  during intervals and lunch breaks and stopped immediately when the bell rang. A variation was playing with one’s hand as the bat.

Under arm cricket with a smaller ball. This was played with bats carved out of a plank of wood. This was played in a closed surrounding and the emphasis was on playing for as long a time as possible. People used to get runs based on the number of over played. Rules varied from getting out to one pitch catches to being declared out if you get hit on the legs three times ( whether you were in front of the wicket or not).  Stumps used to be three lines drawn on a door. Rubber ball used to spin a lot and with underarm played in a short distance (<15 feet) meant that the batsman was always on his feet, literally and other wise. The advantage was that we could play this well into the night as it was purely indoor.

The one played with the normal sized ball wasn’t that much fun as the distance was very short. I have seen awesome underarm cricket played with tennis ball in Chennai streets, but that is a different world altogether.

Cricket with ball badminton ball: we had a long porch (also called thinnai in tamizh) to play cricket. It is something like the cricket nets you see today and it was also that long. We used to play with a rubber ball and broke a few incandescent bulb in the process. After severe rebuke and threats of being banished forever from the place, we switched to ball badminton ball. It was nothing but serendipity that we ended up with a badminton ball at home.  Once we figured out that the ball bounced well and was fast and could even spin, then we switched on to playing with a cricket bat ( again carved out of a plank of wood). Since the ball is made of wool, it doesn’t weight much and is not too big or too small ( max 5.5 cm diameter for those interested), our problem of breaking anything was taken care of.

The rules are very simple. Number of over in any innings was limited. If you hit straight ( without the ball touching the sides of the wall) along the ground, it was a 4 and if it was hit in the air, it was a six. Since the ball was small, if the fielder was agile, one can almost catch anything that was in the air. So batsmen had to be quite careful and play along the ground. This version with the Badminton ball was real fun and gained popularity among our street mates. We played it for a long time and I remember bowling leg spin using the badminton ball and getting wickets. It also helped us to play well in the V. Even today, if you the reader has access to a cement floor , you can still try it. It is lot of fun and chances of breaking any thing is close to zero.

Cricket played with the head of a soft toy: also called 4&6. When we didn’t have money to buy a rubber ball or  badminton ball, one of the more innovative guys, got hold of the head of a rubber toy and there started our  experiments with the toy head. Since it was very small ( the same size of a badminton ball or smaller) and the surface wasn’t even ( heads have eyes and ears and nose too), you couldn’t play like a ball. So we decided that it will be thrown at the batsman and the batsman has to hit it and run. At some point, even that got boring and we switched to throwing underarm. The main difference was that the bowlers come from the batting side and will bowl as per the batsman’s request. The fielders will be from the defending side. Only leg side is allowed and boundary was some 30-40 feet from the pitch ( if you can call it by that name). we had lot of fun playing it this way and again the number of tosses for a batsman was limited. A bat was even customized for this version of the game. When I saw the mongoose bat, I was reminded of  this flavor of the game that we played. To give an analogy that people can relate to, this flavor is similar to baseball and the pitcher throws underarm and helps the batsman  by bowling for runs (only 4 & 6).

Playing tournaments. During my 8^th standard, schools in tamilnadu declared a long holiday due to srilanka tamil agitation. We made use of this opportunity and formed a proper cricket team and started playing matches with cork ball. And this started the days of participating in tournaments and taking cricket seriously. Participating in tournaments meant playing for a prize  (301,401 or 501 INR), travelling to nearby places. Usually there was an entrance fee for the tournament and financially we were all in red,  even if we won the tournament. Local tournaments where we travelled by cycle meant that we ended up with some profit and most of the time, it was spent eating in a hotel and some investment for buying gloves and bats.

I will never forget one such tournament, where our team went to play in Ariyalur. We got to play against one of the cement factories in the location. We batted first and batted poorly and their bowling was very good. We scored 20 odd runs. It was when we started defending the score that the team got the shock of its life as their opening batsmen were wearing helmets. The match was over in less than a handful of overs with our fastest bowler being hit for a few sixes.  Even today, some of the guys will mock that ‘dei, helmet-lam pOtrukAnda’  ( டேய் , ஹெல்மெட்லாம் போட்டிருக்கான்டா!!) when we talk about the good old days.

 The world cup win made me quite nostalgic and recall whatever you read above . This whole post is dedicated to all the wonderful folks  with whom I played cricket.

1. Christchurch in New Zealand was hit by an earthquake yesterday. Several NZ players are from Christchurch and were scrambling to verify if their near and dear are safe. A captain of a team playing in this World Cup was also born in Christchurch and spent his childhood in New Zealand. Which one? (No, not Vettori, obviously!).

2. Ricky Ponting broke an LCD TV, frustrated about something, bad lunch may be. Which other Australian batsman broke a glass panel in an Ashes match, frustrated after getting out?

3.  Who was the Bangladeshi commentator, who along with Sanjay Manju, sent us looking for the mute button?

4. Should Sehwag have sacrificed his wicket so that God wouldn’t have been run out? (Only answer accepted is “Yes”).

Leave the answers in the comments.

We know that 1983 was a watershed moment in the history of Indian cricket. Winning the world cup did wonders for India. Ramachandra Guha, who I admire as a cricket historian, gives several interesting insights on the World Cup, in his book “A Corner of a Foreign Field”. This book, his tome on Indian cricketing history, regales us with little known facts and angles on  the most famous sport in India.

Cricket was already popular across classes, across regions, comparable with only Hindi films. A journalist wrote “Cricket, Lata Mangeshkar and the transistor make India one nation”. Two innovations took this along further. One was satellite television and the second was the growth of One day cricket after the 1983 world cup.

Guha attributes the growing interest in ODI cricket to India successfully hosting the 1987 World Cup, the first time the tournament was held outside England. He calls it a triumph of anti-colonialism. The President of the Indian Cricket Board, N.K.P.Salve, was given just two tickets for the 1983 final at Lord’s. When India made it to the final and he asked MCC for two more passes, and was refused. So he went about organizing a revolt with the associate members of the ICC and was able to get the world cup to India.

India started the 1983 World Cup as 50-1 outsiders and went on to win, beating West Indies at Lord’s. Indira Gandhi, who was India’s Prime Minister at that time, sent out a congratulatory telegram to the cricketers, which said “My slogan is India can do it. Thank you for living up to it”. Apparently, this slogan and cricketers’ photographs were displayed on state-owned petrol stations all over India. I think even if cricketers occasionally seize the moment, politicians never fail to seize the moment and spin it in their favor. May be if India wins this time, Manmohan Singh can probably use it to get a sound bite out of one of the cricketers saying 2G scam never happened and use it in the press.

Guha also notes that when the Indian team went to meet the Prime Minister after winning the world cup, Mrs Gandhi was dressed in cricket colors, a dotted white sari with a matching white blouse! When the boisterous crowd erupted “Kapil Dev Zindabad”, the Indian captain was quick to correct them, asking them to say “Bharat Zindabad”.

I will add more on Guha’s writings on the other World Cups later.

1983 is the earliest world cup I remember. That is mainly because my dad had promised me a camlin fountain pen, if India won the cup. I was woken up the next day morning with the good news that India has won the world cup. Televisions were very few and far in between those days and we were lucky that our neighbor was fan enough to open the door and allow them to watch the TV at the middle of the night. This is after Richard’s rampage, came to an end and people had a glimmer of hope for India.

I have seen the Semi final and final matches many times after the d day.  What remain etched in my memory

• Kirti Azad cleaning up Botham with a ‘low kept’ ball in the semi final
• Srikkanth’s square drive of Roberts and
• Kapil’s catch to remove the dangerous Vivian Richards in the final.

1987 was the first time the world cup (Reliance World Cup) moved out of England. The build up to this world cup was tremendous.  Everyone was rooting for an India Pakistan Final. Those were the pre internet days.  Sportstar did a good job by building up the expectation to the tournament, by covering the previous world cups. Gilmour’s bowling in 1975 world cup semifinal,  the run outs  in the 75 final by an exciting young player called Vivian Richards, and Garner’s bowling in the 1979 final were all described in vivid detail in the build up to the world cup, not to forget the tones of write up about 1983 and Kapil’s devils.

• This was the first time matches were played for 50 overs, compared to the 60 over matches of the previous world cup.
• India made a bad start to the world cup by losing the match with Australia, by a run.  Maninder Singh was the last person to get out, bringing back memories of the famous tied test in the same ground a year earlier.
• Kapil Dev and Kiran More’s batting that saved us the match against NZ.
• Azhar’s bowling against Australia that won us the match against Australia. That was the first time I remember seeing Azhar’s bowling.
• I remember Chetan Sharma’s hat trick, against Newzeland where all his wickets were clean bowled.  People said he had exorcised the ghosts of 1986 Sharjah after this.
• Sunil Gavaskar showed how he can  match Srikanth stroke for stroke or even better him by scoring a century  in the same match. That century also showed how far he had adjusted to One Day cricket after that Ignominious score of 36 runs from 174 balls (in 1975 WC) and carrying his bat in an match which India lost by 202 runs.
• The look on Courtney Walsh’s face when he could have ran Pakistan’s Saleem Jaffer out and won the match for West Indies,  is something I won’t forget. For the records, Pakistan won the match.
• I remember Gooch’s sweeping away Maninder Singh and India’s implosion towards the end, when we lost 5 wickets for 15 runs from a comfortable position to lose the semi final .
• Also, I will not forget Gatting reverse sweeping the world cup out of England’s hands in the finals and Steve Waugh’s death bowling.

1992 was the first time matches were played with colored clothing and white balls and with black sight screens. And for the first time, many of the matches were played under flood lights.

• Brewing Black tea for early start matches.
• Return of south Africa
• Mark Greatbatch’s  knocks opening batting for Newzeland.
• England opening batting with Botham.
• India’s poor run
• Sachin Tendulkar’s first world cup
• Amazing exhibition of swing bowling by Botham against Tendulkar, where Botham had the last laugh.
• India winning against Pakistan.
• Newzeland opening their bowling with Dipak Patel’s off spin
• Much awaited encounter between Srikanth and Dipak Patel, which Patel won hands down after Srikanth holed out to long on for a duck.
• Inzamam ul Haq when he won the semi final for Pakistan ( I remember Imran claiming that he was better than Tendulkar)
• Stupid rain rule that robbed South Africa of what could have been a deserved place in the finals ( 21 out of 13 balls down to 21 out of 1 ball)
• Indians rooting for Pakistan in the finals.
• Imran making the most of a dropped catch and scoring in the finals.
• Wasim Akram’s second spell and those two deliveries that cleaned up Allan Lamb and Chris Lewis.

The prudential cup was on the horizon. I was about 14; One day cricket wasn’t really popular.  With limited live coverage on the state-owned TV – Doordharshan, Marconi’s invention was the only affordable medium to follow the game.

My good old friend “Raghu Ram” nicked named “thatha” [Grandpa] had the ostentatious German Grundig radio that picked BBC. We planned to assemble in his house to listen to the commentary.  Indians had just come back from a tour to the West Indies.  Jimmy Amarnath, SMG, Vengsarkar, Ravi Shastri were among runs however India lost the series by 2-0. Honestly, team India then was not really a one day cricket material. Why bother about winning? 99% of the cricketing community never even considered that Indian team would go beyond the quarterfinals.

The schooling year had just started, and there was not much to study, even if we had some that is a different story. We met after school on the game days and listened to commentary. India beat the West Indies on their tournament opener, if I remember correct, the match finished on a spare day, and the first day’s play interrupted by rain.  The first reaction was “fluke”, due to the spare day situation.  In general an Air India airplane was always waiting at the Heathrow for the team to come back. The world cup progressed with hopes going up and down. The pilot would call or cancel the crew to prepare for the takeoff.

June 18^th:  My parent’s wedding day.  To mark the occasion a family outing was planned to visit the good old marina beach. I was adamant to miss the game [commentary], however after some professional pestering which I am popular for, I was then permitted to take a transistor radio along.  

India played badly right from the world go, 5 wickets down the drain for mere 17 runs.  I was sitting on beach with my radio admiring the light house, commissioner’s office and the AIR building. General junta emotion was calm, the expectation was low for the team. Actually No one really cared.  One Mr. Kapil Dev got into action and went on to score 175 and took India home.  There is no video recording of this game. The local BBC station was on strike. What a pity.  I still remember people standing around listening to the commentary from my radio.  I would call this as the turning point for India in the tournament.  Indians started to play well. Before we knew, Indian team was in the semi-finals. Semi’s at the Old Trafford, the shot Yashpal Sharma played, he flicked a good length ball from Bob Wills over the Square Leg by walking across stumps.  India moved into the Finals.

The finals were telecast live on TV. I watched it in my grandma’s house.  There was no real expectation from the team. West Indies were too powerful. Kapil Devils were not under any kind of pressure. No one expected them to win the game. Indians were happy to have made this far. Note: Today (Gangully’s /) Dhoni’s men do not have this luxury.

Finals at Lords, Tamil Boy my name sake was the highest scorer, He demonstrated aggressive cricket. India scored a meager 183.  Balwinder Singh Sandhu bowled the ball of his life time to get rid of Gordon Greenidge, however Viv Richards was playing so well and WI set to win their 3^rd World cup. Viv Richards has fans across the team boundaries. Doordharshan had to break as they did not book enough satellite time and then had to break for news, by then Viv was out a great catch by Kapil and rest is history.

80s in Chennai is always a happy and fun-filled flash back.

Adios.

Going by the ad, its a cake walk for West Indies and India is hanging in balance .

May be Ireland Vs Netherlands wouldn’t be such an unimportant match after all! Let me work out the math from Day-1. If Ireland wins Bangladesh and if England looses to Netherlands and if West Indies Vs South Africa match rains out, my favorite team in Group B would easily make it to QF.

Can you guess who am I supporting?