A Farewell to Arms

Sourav Ganguly and Rahul Dravid are dropped from the one-day team.

This decision is bound to evoke comment and debate, as it already has. My views are simple - even wars must end someday, and these are merely two glorious careers! These are two intertwined careers that began together and must be celebrated together in their autumn. I choose to recollect briefly my most outstanding memories of the two in the one-day game as India bids farewell to its arms.

Saurav Ganguly came alive for me in the one-day game at Dhaka. This was two years after he had scripted the first amazing chapter of his story at Lords.

1998, Silver Jubilee Independence Cup at National Stadium, Dhaka - India chased down what was then a world record target of 314. It was the first time India successfully chased down such a target. India was anchored in it by Saurav Ganguly who scored a brilliantly planned 124 off just 138 balls with only one six! He was fourth out, exhausted, forty runs from the target. He had done enough that day to ensure India would reach the target Pakistan had set.

There were as many doubters of that as there were Indians in India that afternoon. A 300+ target and Pakistan to boot. Then there was Aaquib Javed, the man who prospered against India so often. But one man believed otherwise and he opened India's batting that day. One expected Sachin to be the one, and he did too intially, getting India off to a brisk start before falling at 41. Ganguly anchored the framework as Robin Singh was promoted up. Together, they saw India through to 250 in 38 overs.

In those days, these were all amazing rates of scoring...they still are uncommon, though not unheard of.

For me, that was the day Saurav the one-day player was born. This was only his second century out of the 22 he has scored in all.

A year earlier, in unusual cricketing environs of Toronto, Sourav had given inklings of his rare ability and spirit to us. Playing Pakistan at this neutral venue, he bowled India to victory. Since then we have learnt that he is a man of substance rather than a flukey existence as many thought of then. That spirit was real, those skills and ability were real. We were to see more of all those many times over.

Then there was that world cup match versus Sri Lanka at Taunton in 1999. India needed to win this one convincingly. He scored 183 of the best one-day runs you'll ever see, and in the company of his fated cricketing partner, Rahul Dravid. Together, they scored 318 runs off 44 overs for the second wicket when Dravid fell for a brilliant 145 (I'll refer to this innings later again). Saurav just went on and saw India reach their record score, for that time, of 373.

I enjoyed each one of the seven booming sixes he scored in that innings. Which brings me to this other ability of his.

In the matter of hitting sixes, he has peers only in Sanath Jayasuriya, Shahid Afridi and Sachin Tendulkar. In fact, there was a large period of time when he was leading the tally.

An element of power smites one in the eye when one looks at all big six hitters; whether in their larger size like Afridi, Chris Cairns, Sir Viv, Inzy and Gilly, or even in the po cket versions of Sanath, Sachin and Ponting. The brutality of power is unmistakable in most of the sixes they have scored. Sourav was completely different from them all....

He was never a pocket dynamo, always frail looking, to the day in fact, and never as largely made as some of the abovementioned players. His sixes never struck you for the power in them, rather, they seduced one with their liquid elegance, flowing execution and drop-like perfection of timing. He is the most graceful six hitter I have ever seen. For me, his sixes didn't bark at me through the television screen, they simply sailed high...like the kites we fly on Independence day. They were regal expressions of a man christened Maharajah. I was lucky to see a few live, at Kotla through the years he played there. Lara is perhaps the closest to him in this regard.

It was that very same match at Taunton which convinced me that Rahul Dravid would have a glorious and useful one-day career. There are few things he does, or has done, which have been of little use to India. Dravid was not just a grey wall for me after that...he was a wall with vivid graffiti ever after.

I still remember the joy I felt at that time. Late afternoon, almost evening, my chest puffed out with pride when I saw that innings. I was in my chamber at work, the day's work done, with colleagues, gathered around a portable television. Oh yes, I remember it all clearly. We felt joy in seeing the y oung man grow into the one-day role with that innings. There were questions asked of his abilities during that time, and he answered each one of them emphatically.

The other innings I remember, more so because the circumstances of it are somewhat similar and so clearly illustrative of Dravid the one-day man; it is the recent match at Bristol in the 2007 one-day series versus England.

This innings is too fresh in our minds for me to add anything to it in words.

There are many more the two have given us to cherish...I merely mention the ones that are prominent in my memories. I feel they are illustrative of the evolution and one-day lives of the two men we call Sourav and Darvid.

Thank you Gentlemen, for the grand times we visited together.

---

A little while ago, at different times in the past, I was very glad that the selectors seemed to want to come back to Saurav and Dravid some time, if the issues of form and distraction should end, because they did not bombard the two to destroy them but only a little in a strategic way . They were after all racks of tall rockets standing to be touched off to a call for help from the Indian team or to signal with if the young turks of Indian cricket were needed to be reminded. I expected that summer spring to come, as it must, but thought it was still some distance away from this beautiful winter. I certainly expected change after the tour of Australia, but the seasons have advanced faster than I thought.

I do not shed tears for your closure from the game, nor spew anger at your exclusion; whenever I sit again in front of the television and watch the spring of India play, and maybe feel lonely for the missing lieutnants, I'll think of your deeds...I'll probably spot shades of those in the scenes before me, and smile.

Dada and The Wall were truly the arms of India.