Pakistan folded with a whimper

It was too much for Pakistan. On what would prove to be the last day of the Test match and the series, Pakistan offered no resistance. They seemed resigned to their fate and there would be no final hurrah. It was the way T S Eliot had foreseen the world ending, ‘‘not with a bang but with a whimper’’.

There is, as expected, a sense of disbelief and with it great anger at Pakistan’s tame surrender. Let me make it clear that no one grudges India’s win. The most die-hard Pakistan cricket fan accepts that India played brilliant cricket and Pakistan could not match it. India was the deserving winner. But the Pakistan team seemed to be in disarray, not just on the last day but all through the Rawalpindi test match. It seemed a troubled team.

It could have been the spate of injuries to its bowlers that could have demoralised it. The only bowler missing was Umar Gul, whose five-wicket haul in India’s first innings in the Lahore test match, in retrospect, is seen as an epic feat of Homeric proportions.

But Pakistan still had Shoaib Akhtar and he bowled furiously fast and had the scalps of Virendra Sehwag, Sachin Tendulkar and VVS Laxman when he took a tumble and appeared to have done some injury to the wrist of his left-hand. The timing could not have been worse. He didn’t take the field for the entire following day and we were told that he had also sustained a rib injury and would be out of action for six weeks. It not only left Pakistan a bowler short but its match-winner. Though it’s been a long time since he won any matches. Shoaib didn’t do his cause any good when he came out to bat, glowing with good health and hitting a few mighty blows, unlikely for a man with a painful rib injury. But Shoaib’s injury had no influence on the course of the test match. India was firmly in command when it occurred. The difference was every Indian player left his foot-marks on the Test match. No Pakistan player did.

Win or lose, India’s tour was an unqualified success. We will never know whether the unprecedented security was necessary and how much credit should be given it for the fact that there was not a single untoward incident. Could it be instead that the good sense of the cricket public both Pakistani and India prevailed? I will reflect on this in another column.

Well played India and congratulations.