Indo-Pak cricket moments…

All this excitement of winning the Multan test brings to mind a few arresting encouters between India and Pakistan.The two teams were playin...

All this excitement of winning the Multan test brings to mind a few arresting encouters between India and Pakistan.

The two teams were playing the finals of the Benson & Hedges World Series in Australia. The final was on a Sunday and, on the following day, our annual examination was set to begin — with Mathematics, the most dreaded of all, as the first paper! I was, however, pleasantly surprised when my father offered to drop me at his friend’s place. It had the first and only TV in town! For the first time I watched a cricket match live! The excitement and joy of witnessing a wonderful bowling performance from India was tempered by the consternation of having to prepare for maths at the end of the day, and I resisted the temptation of watching the Indian innings.

Then there was the memory of my sister introducing me to the world of cricket over bits and pieces of radio commentary. It was the Rothmans Cup match in Sharjah and India had been bowled out for 125 runs. We were listening to the match on Radio Pakistan and the reception went blank just as Imran Khan got out for a duck. Once again, we missed being ‘live’ witnesses to a memorable Indian victory.

Javed Miandad was taking Pakistan to a great victory when we had to catch a train to Chennai to attend a cousin’s wedding! When all of us reluctantly left our respective perches before the TV set and headed for the station, India was in a comfortable position and we were excited about celebrating the victory in the train. However, the sonorous voice of the newsreader of the 7.30 pm news on AIR informed us of Javed Miandad’s spectacular six of the last ball. The faces of the people in our coupe registered the disappointment of that moment, each one of them. We were relieved that we were saved the blushes of watching India lose on that last ball on TV!

Cycling from school to home took me hardly 10 minutes. If there were no stops in between, that is. But the days of cricket matches invariably meant that the time taken would depend on the situation prevailing on the field! Once again, India was playing Pakistan, this time at Sharjah. At the first stop — a stationery store with a small portable TV set — my friend and I were relieved to find that India was in a comfortable situation.

At the next stop — it was a TV showroom en route was hardly a kilometre away — we were shocked to read the score. What we had missed was Aaquib Javed’s famous LBW hat trick!

All these vignettes came back to me as I watched Kumble bowl his magic at Multan.