Land of Lime

It is quite depressing to write about the Faisalabad test match; in fact, about the series itself. If yesterday (January 24th) was the most depressing day of the year, apparently today is the national compliment day. So I can not and will not abuse anybody.

Yet, consider these numbers. In the two test matches, Pakistan has made 1767 runs losing 25 wickets in the process, with each wicket costing Indian bowlers an average of 70.68 runs. India has scored 1034 runs for the loss of 11 wickets, scoring on an average of 94 runs per wicket. I don’t even want to count the number of centuries scored and boundaries/sixers hit, or on the quality of incandescent batting from both sides. As I lamented last week, can we see some discipline in bowling and a little bit of guile? Perhaps, I am being unreasonable, since after a session on such a track, bowlers would like to drown their sorrows in alcohol, if not commit suicide. So, hoping Karachi would offer a more ’sporting and equitable’ wicket, let point out a positive here, another there: the maturing daredevilry of Shahid Afridi and Mahendar Singh Dhoni, Irfan Pathan’s cricketing intelligence, Dravid’s display of batting technique, which led to Danish Kaneria’s exasperated admiration (Dravid doesn’t need to wear leg pads!) and so on.

The match itself deserves no comment or report and even that cricket enthusiast coach of mine, Prabhakar, would not have watched much of this test. Further, my favorite sport (bash up the white man) is also getting old, although there is a deserving candidate this week in Michael Atherton, who wrote a lousy column (which I shall not link) venting against the ever growing influence of the brown beast (Jambu dvipa) in world cricket, which respects nobody, creates anarchy and out of that its own order. I do want to bring to your attention something that Prem Panicker reported:

“As Harbhajan floated another doosra at Younis, with slip, silly point, leg slip and short square leg waiting in hope, Waqar Younis told his fellow commentator Dean Jones that Faisalabad is a textile city particularly known for its cottons, samples of which he should pick up for his lady; Deano responded by saying he was pleasantly surprised by the
rapid pace of agricultural development in those parts.”

Why wouldn’t Deano be surprised? He has been coming to this part of the world for only twenty years and being an Australian, what does he know about anything that happened in and around Faisalabad five thousand years ago, when agricultural development began? I guess this deserves one more ‘collection drive’ to educate our Australian friend about South Asian civilization! He might need that if he were to ever coach one of the South Asian teams.

Deano isn’t the only ignorant one. My friend Krishna Prasad comments today on Virendar Sehwag’s ignorance. Apparently, the ‘butcher from Najafgarh’ didn’t know anything about Vinoo Mankad and Pankaj Roy, whose world record for opening partnership he was about to break in the Lahore test. What do we expect our cricketing heroes to know about their country, civilization and cricketing tradition? There is the Steve Waugh/Rahul Dravid (who ironically was Sehwag’s partner in trying to establish a new world record) model, of the studious, curious, informed and well grounded in history. Well, then there are others, whom we shall not categorize, this being the national compliments day and all. Sehwag himself has an uncluttered, non-analytical, intuitive approach to all matters, cricket and life. It has worked for him, and for Indian cricket. Surely, his stroke play and even mental toughness aren’t going to benefit by knowing more about Vinoo Mankad. But some of us are in the business of spreading the gospel of curiosity (especially about our own past) and hence, feel compelled to make at least an offer to Viru: free cricket history lessons every now and then. Me and Sepoy will even ensure that Sehwags and Afridis will have free access to their uncluttered minds, so that they can continue to do what they are good at: bring us joy every once in a while.