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If the Men in Blue made the whole nation go wild with celebrations after winning the World Cup, their humiliation at the hands of England left the fans shocked and furious. Amit Chaudhary evaluates the year gone by
The year 2011 was such an eventful one for cricket in India that it’s very difficult to summarise the high of winning the World Cup and low of losing the golden mace (for No 1 Test team) together. Reaching a conclusion in that situation, trying to find or coin an adjective that could define it all, would be a tough job.
Even if we choose an easier way out, take a coin, let one side settle the year as good and another as bad, in all probability it would land just like that hypothetical situation —standing on its edge. And, that somehow, would be a fair assessment of how the year fared for Indian cricket. The euphoria that gripped the entire nation after MS Dhoni’s powerful hit over long-on boundary in the final brought home the World Cup to the humiliation in England; the whole story is metaphorically same as that coin.
The no-conclusion then seems quite apt as the loss of Numero Uno status in Tests can’t undermine the importance of tears of joy that many players, including Sachin Tendulkar and Dhoni, shed on that fateful night of April 2.
“After the final match was over, all the players cried. I also cried. It was very difficult to control emotions as we all were dreaming of winning the World Cup,” Dhoni revealed some time back.
Indian cricket seemed to be on an ascent when the side held both the ODI and the Test top spot in April and the mismanagement issues that preceded the flagship event were happily forgotten. But the BCCI didn’t even let the feeling sink in properly and gave a reality check in the form of Indian Premier League (IPL) which started just six days after India lifted the World Cup trophy after 28 years.
The result: players broke down and the world champions, after enjoying the peak of success, saw the depth of failure. India became the first team to lose by a huge margin (4-0) after landing at the English shores with the No 1 tag. They couldn’t win any match, neither an ODI nor even a T20.
Chief Administrative Officer of the BCCI, Ratnakar Shetty, called it the ‘only sad part’ in an otherwise wonderful year.
“It was a mixed year for India. World Cup win was a great achievement for the Indian team but we did not do well in England and lost on the rankings in Test cricket. Still, I feel that the team did well in the ODI format,” Shetty told The Pioneer. “The only sad part is that we could have done better in England. I think in the first two Tests we were not in a bad position but still we lost them.”
The series of injuries that started on the first day of the first Test against England, when Zaheer Khan, India’s lead bowler, limped out of the ground clutching his hamstring, to never return to the ground for the next six months, continued throughout the tour and saw as many as 10 Indian players getting injured. While the board served ‘too many players were injured’ as a stale reason behind the poor show, the underlying question of ‘why the players’ injuries were not managed properly?’ still remain unanswered.
However, the Indian team kept their home record intact beating England 5-0 in the ODI series here and returned to winning ways in the Tests by beating the West Indies.
“As far as one-day cricket is concerned it (the year) was good,” former India opener Chetan Chauhan said. “At home, we were very good but outside we didn’t do that well.”
Maninder Singh, however, felt that the World Cup win was enough to make up for every thing else. “We won the World Cup, which was a pleasure. But the debacle in England really hurt. But winning the World Cup gave us so much pleasure that we can live on that for some time,” he said.
Currently on a tough tour Down Under, India have a chance to resurrect their position in the rankings and inch towards the top spot. As Rocky outlined the spirit of a true champ, ‘It’s not how hard you hit, it’s how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward.’
Also, we would not want to leave it to a coin in 2012.
Aussies ODI toppers
The former world champions might have lost the throne and the aura around them has faded a bit but they still hold the No 1 spot in ICC ODI rankings. Except the World Cup, Australia won every ODI series in 2011. They roughed up England 6-1, humiliated Bangladesh (3-0), beat Sri Lanka 3-2 and South Africa 2-1. In all, Australia won 18 out of 25 ODI matches.
England toppled India
In white flannels there was no match for England. They started the year by winning their first Ashes in Australia in 24 years and then went on to beat every team they played with including a 4-0 whitewash of India at their home to become the
No 1 Test nation in the ICC rankings. Though India remained at the top for most part of the year, Andrew Strauss-led side, which remained unbeaten in the eight Tests (6 wins, 2 draws) they played, proved their supremacy over India.
Retired
World’s fastest bowler Shoaib Akhtar, who has the distinction of clocking at 100mph, called time on his Pakistan career after the World Cup. The controversial, injury prone fast bowler finished with 178 Test and 247 ODI wickets.
World’s highest wicket-taker in both Tests and ODIs, Muttiah Muralitharan brought the curtains down on his international career after the World Cup final against India in Mumbai. He took 800 Test and 534 ODI wickets in his 18-year-long career.
Sri Lanka’s powerful opening batsman, Sanath Jayasuriya, took leave from international cricket after playing two limited-overs matches against England in June. He had been a useful all-rounder for his team scoring 13,430 ODI and 6,973 Test runs besides taking 323 ODI and 98 Test wickets.
Rip
Former India captain Nawab Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi, popularly known as ‘Tiger’, passed away in New Delhi on September 22nd following lung infection at the age of 70. Tiger, who lost his right eye in an accident, is regarded as one of the finest Indian captains. He played 46 Tests for the country, scoring 2793 runs for an average of 34.91. Unbeaten 203 remains his highest score.
Former Somerset captain and high-profile cricket writer/analyst and TV commentator Peter Roebuck committed suicide in mysterious circumstances on November 12th in Cape Town at age 55. According to the police, he jumped to his death from the sixth floor of his hotel after he was questioned for an alleged sexual assault on a boy. He was covering the Aus-SA Test series.
Terry Jenner was a very popular name among leg-spinners. He played nine Tests for Australia but the real fame came to him as a coach. He trained the most successful leg-spinner in cricket, Shane Warne. The coach died on May 25th at the age of 66.
Missing crowd
The ceaseless cricket played throughout the year, including WC followed by IPL and other meaningless bilateral series, took its toll on the spectators. The India-England ODI series, termed ‘the revenge series’, bore most of the brunt of cricket fatigue that had set in the country. Despite India winning, spectators didn’t seem to take notice of their favourite team. Interestingly, India’s first F1 GP attracted around 95,000 people.
Old guard rocks
“The year has been tremendous for him (Rahul Dravid). I think it has been one of the best years of his career; three 100s in England and keeping that form back home. Of course he was unfortunate that he didn’t play the World Cup,” said Chetan Chauhan as The Wall showed that he is still impregnable.
The rise of youth
R Ashwin, Pragyan Ojha and Umesh Yadav were the discoveries for India.
Varun Aaron also impressed in the limited opportunities he got. For Australia, Pat Cummins won them a Test in South Africa and James Pattinson also impressed. Vernon Philander’s four five-wicket hauls in first three Testes for SA forced everyone to take notice.
Jailed
For the first time in cricket’s history any international cricketer was jailed for an on-field crime when the tainted-trio of Pakistan — Salman Butt, Mohammad Asif and Mohammad Amir — were found guilty of conspiracy to bowl deliberate no-balls in last year’s Test match against England, ironically, at the Lord’s cricket ground which is considered the ‘Mecca’ of cricket. Butt was given a jail term of 30 months, Asif was jailed for one year and the 19-year-old Amir was sentenced to six months by Justice Cooke of the Southwark Crown Court. The agent who fixed the deal with these cricketers, Mazhar Majeed, was jailed for 32 months. Hopefully, the judgement would prove to be a deterrent and no other cricketer would ever try to indulge in such activities.
Tell-all books
Cricketers indulged in sassy acts to hog limelight. Former Pakistan pacer Shoaib Akhtar’s Controversially Yours made uncomplimentary allegations against Tendulkar merely to make his book a hit.
Former Indian coach Greg Chappell made his distaste for India and former Indian skipper Sourav Ganguly public in his book Fierce Focus.
England off-spinner Graeme Swann’s The Breaks Are Off questioned Kevin Pietersen’s captaincy.
Memorable
In two years, two Indian batsmen crossed the 200-run mark in the 50-over format. While Sachin Tendulkar (200 not out) became the first cricketer ever to score a double hundred in an ODI last year, this year Virender Sehwag set another benchmark with his 219-run innings against the West Indies
The year 2011 was such an eventful one for cricket in India that it’s very difficult to summarise the high of winning the World Cup and low of losing the golden mace (for No 1 Test team) together. Reaching a conclusion in that situation, trying to find or coin an adjective that could define it all, would be a tough job.
Even if we choose an easier way out, take a coin, let one side settle the year as good and another as bad, in all probability it would land just like that hypothetical situation —standing on its edge. And, that somehow, would be a fair assessment of how the year fared for Indian cricket. The euphoria that gripped the entire nation after MS Dhoni’s powerful hit over long-on boundary in the final brought home the World Cup to the humiliation in England; the whole story is metaphorically same as that coin.
The no-conclusion then seems quite apt as the loss of Numero Uno status in Tests can’t undermine the importance of tears of joy that many players, including Sachin Tendulkar and Dhoni, shed on that fateful night of April 2.
“After the final match was over, all the players cried. I also cried. It was very difficult to control emotions as we all were dreaming of winning the World Cup,” Dhoni revealed some time back.
Indian cricket seemed to be on an ascent when the side held both the ODI and the Test top spot in April and the mismanagement issues that preceded the flagship event were happily forgotten. But the BCCI didn’t even let the feeling sink in properly and gave a reality check in the form of Indian Premier League (IPL) which started just six days after India lifted the World Cup trophy after 28 years.
The result: players broke down and the world champions, after enjoying the peak of success, saw the depth of failure. India became the first team to lose by a huge margin (4-0) after landing at the English shores with the No 1 tag. They couldn’t win any match, neither an ODI nor even a T20.
Chief Administrative Officer of the BCCI, Ratnakar Shetty, called it the ‘only sad part’ in an otherwise wonderful year.
“It was a mixed year for India. World Cup win was a great achievement for the Indian team but we did not do well in England and lost on the rankings in Test cricket. Still, I feel that the team did well in the ODI format,” Shetty told The Pioneer. “The only sad part is that we could have done better in England. I think in the first two Tests we were not in a bad position but still we lost them.”
The series of injuries that started on the first day of the first Test against England, when Zaheer Khan, India’s lead bowler, limped out of the ground clutching his hamstring, to never return to the ground for the next six months, continued throughout the tour and saw as many as 10 Indian players getting injured. While the board served ‘too many players were injured’ as a stale reason behind the poor show, the underlying question of ‘why the players’ injuries were not managed properly?’ still remain unanswered.
However, the Indian team kept their home record intact beating England 5-0 in the ODI series here and returned to winning ways in the Tests by beating the West Indies.
“As far as one-day cricket is concerned it (the year) was good,” former India opener Chetan Chauhan said. “At home, we were very good but outside we didn’t do that well.”
Maninder Singh, however, felt that the World Cup win was enough to make up for every thing else. “We won the World Cup, which was a pleasure. But the debacle in England really hurt. But winning the World Cup gave us so much pleasure that we can live on that for some time,” he said.
Currently on a tough tour Down Under, India have a chance to resurrect their position in the rankings and inch towards the top spot. As Rocky outlined the spirit of a true champ, ‘It’s not how hard you hit, it’s how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward.’
Also, we would not want to leave it to a coin in 2012.
Aussies ODI toppers
The former world champions might have lost the throne and the aura around them has faded a bit but they still hold the No 1 spot in ICC ODI rankings. Except the World Cup, Australia won every ODI series in 2011. They roughed up England 6-1, humiliated Bangladesh (3-0), beat Sri Lanka 3-2 and South Africa 2-1. In all, Australia won 18 out of 25 ODI matches.
England toppled India
In white flannels there was no match for England. They started the year by winning their first Ashes in Australia in 24 years and then went on to beat every team they played with including a 4-0 whitewash of India at their home to become the
No 1 Test nation in the ICC rankings. Though India remained at the top for most part of the year, Andrew Strauss-led side, which remained unbeaten in the eight Tests (6 wins, 2 draws) they played, proved their supremacy over India.
Retired
World’s fastest bowler Shoaib Akhtar, who has the distinction of clocking at 100mph, called time on his Pakistan career after the World Cup. The controversial, injury prone fast bowler finished with 178 Test and 247 ODI wickets.
World’s highest wicket-taker in both Tests and ODIs, Muttiah Muralitharan brought the curtains down on his international career after the World Cup final against India in Mumbai. He took 800 Test and 534 ODI wickets in his 18-year-long career.
Sri Lanka’s powerful opening batsman, Sanath Jayasuriya, took leave from international cricket after playing two limited-overs matches against England in June. He had been a useful all-rounder for his team scoring 13,430 ODI and 6,973 Test runs besides taking 323 ODI and 98 Test wickets.
Rip
Former India captain Nawab Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi, popularly known as ‘Tiger’, passed away in New Delhi on September 22nd following lung infection at the age of 70. Tiger, who lost his right eye in an accident, is regarded as one of the finest Indian captains. He played 46 Tests for the country, scoring 2793 runs for an average of 34.91. Unbeaten 203 remains his highest score.
Former Somerset captain and high-profile cricket writer/analyst and TV commentator Peter Roebuck committed suicide in mysterious circumstances on November 12th in Cape Town at age 55. According to the police, he jumped to his death from the sixth floor of his hotel after he was questioned for an alleged sexual assault on a boy. He was covering the Aus-SA Test series.
Terry Jenner was a very popular name among leg-spinners. He played nine Tests for Australia but the real fame came to him as a coach. He trained the most successful leg-spinner in cricket, Shane Warne. The coach died on May 25th at the age of 66.
Missing crowd
The ceaseless cricket played throughout the year, including WC followed by IPL and other meaningless bilateral series, took its toll on the spectators. The India-England ODI series, termed ‘the revenge series’, bore most of the brunt of cricket fatigue that had set in the country. Despite India winning, spectators didn’t seem to take notice of their favourite team. Interestingly, India’s first F1 GP attracted around 95,000 people.
Old guard rocks
“The year has been tremendous for him (Rahul Dravid). I think it has been one of the best years of his career; three 100s in England and keeping that form back home. Of course he was unfortunate that he didn’t play the World Cup,” said Chetan Chauhan as The Wall showed that he is still impregnable.
The rise of youth
R Ashwin, Pragyan Ojha and Umesh Yadav were the discoveries for India.
Varun Aaron also impressed in the limited opportunities he got. For Australia, Pat Cummins won them a Test in South Africa and James Pattinson also impressed. Vernon Philander’s four five-wicket hauls in first three Testes for SA forced everyone to take notice.
Jailed
For the first time in cricket’s history any international cricketer was jailed for an on-field crime when the tainted-trio of Pakistan — Salman Butt, Mohammad Asif and Mohammad Amir — were found guilty of conspiracy to bowl deliberate no-balls in last year’s Test match against England, ironically, at the Lord’s cricket ground which is considered the ‘Mecca’ of cricket. Butt was given a jail term of 30 months, Asif was jailed for one year and the 19-year-old Amir was sentenced to six months by Justice Cooke of the Southwark Crown Court. The agent who fixed the deal with these cricketers, Mazhar Majeed, was jailed for 32 months. Hopefully, the judgement would prove to be a deterrent and no other cricketer would ever try to indulge in such activities.
Tell-all books
Cricketers indulged in sassy acts to hog limelight. Former Pakistan pacer Shoaib Akhtar’s Controversially Yours made uncomplimentary allegations against Tendulkar merely to make his book a hit.
Former Indian coach Greg Chappell made his distaste for India and former Indian skipper Sourav Ganguly public in his book Fierce Focus.
England off-spinner Graeme Swann’s The Breaks Are Off questioned Kevin Pietersen’s captaincy.
Memorable
In two years, two Indian batsmen crossed the 200-run mark in the 50-over format. While Sachin Tendulkar (200 not out) became the first cricketer ever to score a double hundred in an ODI last year, this year Virender Sehwag set another benchmark with his 219-run innings against the West Indies
