The Great Resurrection

They say faces tell stories. Six months ago, during the World Cup in West Indies I remember the faces of Dravid and Sachin in the Indian balcony showed the disappointment and shock of exiting the World Cup in the first round. And just yesterday, life came a full circle, as the faces of Dhoni and team showed the joy and hope of a new dawn. Dhoni has done what so far only a legend of Indian cricket, Kapil Dev could do. And we witnessed what we missed when we were just too young (in 1983). The joy and awe of watching our team win the cup. We waited and waited and waited, and it came when we least expected it. There will be people saying that 20-20 is just not cricket. Well if it is not cricket, so be it. But it was the same for all the teams. And we came out on the top in that. The power and fearlessness of youth led India to a level that no level of maturity can take. It was great and inspiring to see each player in the team, fighting whole heartedly for the team, contributing in whatever way he could, and help the team clinch the cup. And doing what they did without Sachin, Saurav and Dravid just showed sometimes how we get hooked to a certain player, and how we attach greatness to individual records rather than team records. It was a perfect display for young players to see what team work is, and how the sum of the parts in a sport can be greater than that in mathematics. Such was the effort that I found it difficult to single out a single player. Whether it was Sehwag’s initial burst in a couple of matches, or Yuvraj’s maniacal hitting in some of the others; whether it was the clinical bowling of RP Singh and Irfan, or the idiosyncrasies of Sreesanth; whether it was the brilliant catch by Dinesh Karthik, or the immaculate run outs affected by Rohit Sharma and Robin Uthappa; whether it was Harbhajan’s and Joginder’s bowling in the death overs, or it was Gambhir’s knock in the beginning of the innings; And whether it was Dhoni in the captain’s seat, or the team which he captained, I just can’t single out any one thing that led to this victory. But victory it was, and what a way to achieve it, beating England, South Africa, Australia and Pakistan in back to back matches in a week. It has been years we witnessed something so refreshing in this Indian side. And the stark similarity with the 1983 warriors cannot go unnoticed. Both were teams, that no one gave a chance in the tournament to begin with. I remember reading somewhere the odds of India winning the 1983 world cup at the beginning of the world cup were 1:2500. Both surprised everyone, and just kept winning match after match. Both won low scoring finals, batting first. And in both the world cups there was no major player who can be singled out to be responsible for the team’s win. It was a combined team effort. And the biggest similarity. The prophecy!! When Zimbabwe defeat Australia in the World Cup, we win the world cup. So keep it up Zimbabwe.

 

The Indian team is on the path to resurrection. It will be immature as well as incorrect to say that we are the best team, but this new team has shown that we have the makings of one.