Memories from a glorious night for Indian Cricket and Ashish Nehra.
Four years ago , it was the same headline. India were starting their roll with impressive victories in the 2003 World Cup. On that night however Ganguly called the toss right and was well rewarded. The Kingsmead ground is notorious for its producing prodigious swing under the lights. India batted first and made 250 thanks to some belligerent batting from Tendulkar ( how can anyone forget Tendulkar hook off Caddick for a six ) and the reconstruction effort of Yuvraj and Dravid. 250 was a decent score we all thought, something that was defendable but also overhaulable easily. It was the final year of my college and watching with friends was the joy. Srinath and Zaheer produced one of the best opening spells that I have seen by an Indian pair. The ball whizzed around for the first 10 odd overs and it was time for a bowling change. I had never been a great believer in Ashish Nehra's talent. I always felt he was overrated and feared that all the good work done by Srinath and Zaheer might be undone by Nehra. I even voiced the opinion and crossed my fingers in the hope that that wouldn't happen. My roommate in college - Vijay - just had this to say - He bowls quick and it swings for him. He is bound to bowl well today. That was a sort of premonition as Nehra hit the straps and ended up with 6 wickets and the best spell by an Indian in a world cup match. Puking on the ground , eating bananas didn't seem to affect his bowling that day. it was on the off , it either swung in suddenly or moved away from the batsman very late. Batsman after batsman succumed to that clinical display of swing bowling. Ashish Nehra as the picture shows was unstoppable
With another match today with the same title as this one , I hope India can win this match which has become a must win for them to stay in the tournament.
No comments:
Post a Comment