What more does it take to win a match, I keep wondering. Making a game out of a 350-run herculean chase, while keeping the asking rate under control all throughout the game, apparently does not do it. What matters is finishing off, something India will rue till the day they forget this match (translates to never...).
It all started with a 93 (89 balls) from Shane Watson and a 112 (112 balls) from Shaun Marsh. With most batsmen contributing good, solid double figures and giving the Indian bowlers a hammering of a lifetime, Australia had made a huge pile of runs for India to chase, 350 to be exact.
Chasing 351 to win, I and many like me had given up on the match that India was expected to chase in. I and many like me (being Indians) were still glued to our television sets, just for the sake of curiosity (and because we cannot by a rule watch anything else when an India match is going on), to know by how much will India lose by. Yet, India is capable of miracles both this way and that. They can be all out at the world's smallest score and also chase down huge ones with ease (well, maybe not quite like South Africa. I still remember how the whacked the Aussies in their 400 plus run chase).
Sehwag, as always, came up with a good blistering though short knock of a 30 ball 38. While wickets kept falling on the one end post-Sehwag, there was still one thing standing between Australia and victory.
A man named Sachin Tendulkar. He crossed 17000 ODI runs in this match but everyone was soon to forget this tiny detail. Tiny, for what me and many others like me will remember instead is the face of one man. Ricky Ponting. As each ball sailed over the boundary rope, some yellow shoulders drooped some more. With each sound of leather and willow, certain blue hopes rose some more. He made 175 in 141 balls and fell to the most terrible, un-Sachin-like shot ever. What followed is what we have all seen before. His carefully laid foundation crumpled like a castle of playing cards. There was no one to hold the scepter post-Sachin and India lost by a meager 4 runs.
While Gambhir, Yuvraj and Dhoni fell for just 8, 9 and 6 runs respectively, it was Suresh Raina (59) and Ravindra Jadeja (23) that supported Sachin's brave innings. Praveen Kumar tried his best in the end to salvage what Sachin had left incomplete, but even his efforts fell short.
There is nothing noteworthy to say about the bowling on both sides as a game that saw 600 plus runs being scored would certainly not have left any bowler clean and un-clobbered. What I will remember in this match, more than a certain Mr. Tendulkar is Mr. Praveen Kumar. The guy laid out his heart for the match and it was very clearly visible from the way he was batting. When he got run out in the end, it was he I had tears for, not India nor Sachin (that came later, much later during the presentation ceremony). Every ball the last wicket Munaf Patel was facing, saw me pale faced (white as a ghost), glued to the set with my heart in my mouth, praying fervently that 'just once God, please let his bat touch the ball and he still be not out, just once'. In trying to keep Munaf away from facing more balls, Praveen lost his wicket. After my one 'first second' reaction of swearing, blaming and cursing a blue streak (in the very same order), I returned back to sanity. I could only imagine the pressure on Pravin for after Sachin it is not easy, never easy.. What went down was a Chennai repeat.
The match left me with tonnes of ifs and buts - Why did Sachin play such a stupid shot? Why did Harbhajan not see us through? etc. etc. Adrenaline gets to everyone and if at all we should remember this match, it is not for the loss but for the fact that a match was made out of it. Wasn't having Ricky Ponting have heart palpitations fun? Then let us not play the blame game (though we are all fickle with our opinions and over-passionate about the game). Let us leave them all alone tonight and every other such night. They can't be feeling any worse, especially Sachin.
What we can do however, is analyze why no one can hold the innings together post a good knock from Sachin. It is like some kind of conspiracy from God, for everyone normally does a fine job of it, just not after a good knock of Sachin. It seems Sachin must bear the cross, of never being there to make India cross the finish line, yet again. I wonder how many more innings will he have to play till someone, anyone, steps up to the challenge.
Sachin, if someone's blaming you for losing your wicket at the crux of the match, don't despair. No one's harsher on you than yourself. Me and many like me still stand by you today, just like every other day, minute, second and breath.
One last thing before I sign off. Here's something for you to ask yourself. When (and of course if) Ponting surpasses Sachin in runs, in any format of the game, there will still be a difference between the two of them. Sachin will be great because he is humble and Ponting will be well, Australian (translated to 'arrogant'). Which great would you prefer, I wonder.
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