India vs Australia ,Kolkata , 11-15 March 2001
Cricinfo URL : http://www.cricinfo.com/ci/engine/match/63920.html
Absolutely no surprise at all. If you ask any Indian cricket fan about which is the best test match that he has seen, this particular test match is the most likely answer. And why not, this is the test match which kick-started the process of India becoming one of the top test teams in the world.
I still remember this test match as if I had seen this yesterday. This test match happened at the worst possible time from my perspective. I was busy preparing for yet another worthless semester exams of my engineering, I was in the middle of 5th semester exams.
As always, I was more inclined to watch the cricket match, than prepare to the exam, which obviously reflected in my 5th SEM results, I got 73-74%, which was my lowest in all 8 semesters. But that was worth it, India won this series J
Day 1:
Match started with the news of aussies winning the toss and opting to bat. Aussies did justice to the star studded batting that they had, they got a solid start and went on to make a formidable score.
Indian bowlers were just plundered, but until the moment our own bhajji came to the party. He changed the course of the match(momentarily) with a hatrick! I think the first hatrick by an indian bowler in test matches. Day 1 was over with india needing to take just 2 more wickets.
Day 2:
But aussies as usual were not in any mood to give up so easily. The legend of steve Waugh was still batting. He frustrated the indian bowlers and got a great partnership with Jason Gillespie and propelled the score to 445.
As any optimistic indian cricket fan, I thought “NO PROBLEM “ we have the batting to overhaul this easily J. I got scared I would fail the next day , so switched off the tv and went back to studies.
Came out of the room after 2-3 hours , and India had lost 8 wickets by end of day 2 after scoring 120+ runs ! I cursed myself for wasting my time watching aussie batting and ruining my preparation for exam too. I vowed ( yet again ) that I will never watch indian cricket once again J
Day 3:
I lived up to my promise and didn’t see whole of day 3. This is because I had to go write the exam J (penultimate exam of that semester)
got to know that India were 4 down for 250 by the end of day, with VVS laxman scoring a century and still playing , and Rahul had just started to bat.
Nobody had any idea as to what was about to happen the next day
Day 4:
I had only one exam left which was OPERATING SYSTEMS, which was scheduled on the 5th day of the test match. I assumed I wouldn’t miss any cricket action as india would be allout and be defeated by an innings on day 4.
I had no idea this would be the day Indian (and Australian) cricket would remember forever.
I had the last exam next day, had to prepare myself to attempt for atleast 100 marks. Divided my time from morning 10 till night 2’o clock into 4 segments
Morning 10-1 ( 30 marks worth of studies)
Noon 2-5 ( 30 marks worth of studies)
Evening 6-9 ( 30 marks worth of studies)
Night 10-2 ( remaining 10 marks and revision) ……….. was a foolproof plan.
But VVS laxman and rahul dravid had counter-plans for my exams ! I blame laxman … he started the day with a flurry of boundaries ! and then rahul joined him. The same thing continued through the day.
Because of the way these two guys played , I prepared only for 30 marks till 5 in the evening , needing another 70 marks worth of studies !! .. my plan went haywire , I still blame laxman and dravid , I scored only 56 in Operating System because of them J
India “following on” scored 335 runs with loss of ZERO wickets J … and I was damn happy . I thought even if I score less in OS who cares , it was totally worth it J
End of day 4 - India 2nd innings 589/4 (VVS Laxman 275*, R Dravid 155*)
Day 5:
Got up on this day being extremely nervous about the exam, but I was more excited about the prospect of laxman getting a triple hundred. I didn’t care much about the match as I thought it would be a draw. I didn’t see India bowling aussies out in 2 sessions.
Match started , dravid got out , laxman got out , ganguly declared. I was happy that we pulled off an amazing test match from the jaws of defeat , and I headed for the exam thinking that we should win the next match in Chennai to square the series.
But what happened while I was writing the exam was the best part of the match.
I am jealous that my brother got to see it and I didn’t L
Bhajji got 6 wickets, more importantly sachin got 3 wickets J and INDIA WON !!!!!
The most ironical among those wickets was
Sachin tendulkar ( all time greatest BATSMAN ) getting Shane warne ( all time greatest leg spinner) out by a GOOGLY !!!!!!!!!!!
6 comments:
Aaaah, I remember the match clearly and watched most of it as well, since the BU engg exams were always later than the VTU ones, remember :)
lucky bugger ! ... VTU guys were all unfortunate
haladdu afternoon 2-5 exam ittu ... classic last session nodakke aglilla :(
live nodo maja'ne bere
dabba nan magne, enappa idu woh paanch din anta nodidre, cricket. kharma.
ha ha :) ... "Paanch" annode ondu dodda clue alveno :) .... moreover my area of specialisation is
Cricket
Movies
Whats wrong with india and indians
idu bitre bere subjects mele bareyo probablity tumba kadime :)
I stil remeber this match as I decided not to see test match after day 2 of match and i stick to plan on day 3 and on day 4 on hot mumbai afternoon, on our way back to home from college, along with four friends we heard the score and we all were shouting on almost empty street that "Kya ho raha hey"[what the hell is going on], "How come these 2 [Dravid and VVS] still playing?" and roadside Paanwala laughed big way with great mustache and said "dono hi chipak gaya hey, bohat mara unke bowlervaa ko, maza aa gaya". When I look back I can safely say all indians love test criket equally and this match has lot to contribute to it. Day 5 I seen ball by ball to see what it was a history in making. It also marked another history in making for my personal life as I watched this match at friends place as we didn't had TV at home. Friend , his sister and me all had exams very near by so we had books in hand for name sack and as match progressed, books were deserted and we celebrated each wicket by screming on top of our voice. My frind and his sister went on to become monks later and that was last time I spent whole day together with them.
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