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DATE : 06-12-1991

VENUE : W.A.C.A, Perth

MATCH : 1st ODI, Benson And Hedges World Series

Writer : B.V.Swagath

The venue for the intriguing one day international, I am talking about is at the W.A.C.A, Perth known for producing the fastest wicket in the world. The Indian batsmen were in for an acid test against the West Indies pace battery on this Batsmen’s graveyard. Let me take you back to the 6th of December, 1991, a date which Indians remember for the wrong reasons. We are about to relive the opening game of the Benson and Hedges World Series featuring three fascinating sides in Australia, West Indies and India. And yes it was all set for the first match with the Azhar led India taking on the Richie Richardson led West Indies.

Bengal’s medium pacer Subroto Banerjee was presented with an ODI debut. Richie Richardson won the toss and without any second thoughts, he decided to leave the freshness of the wicket to his intimidating pace attack of Pattrick Patterson, Curtly Ambrose, Malcolm Marshall and Anderson Cummins. The Indian lineup had some good batsmen in the dashing Srikkanth, the solid Sanjay Manjrekar, the teenage sensation Sachin Tendulkar, the stylish Md.Azharuddin and the ultimate Kapil Dev. A fantastic batting line up indeed on paper, but in reality can these batsmen whither the storm of the West Indies pace quartet on the fastest wicket? All about this would be known very shortly.

The Indian openers Ravi Shastri and Krish Srikkanth were in for some nasty stuff in the middle. Krishnamachari Srikkanth was the first blood drawn by Pattrick Patterson as the former surrendered meekly to leave India at 1/8. Then what followed was a painful snail crawling partnership for the second wicket between Ravi Shastri and Sanjay Manjrekar. It was all pains than gains out of this partnership and the end of Manjrekar came with the score at 2/35 as the little but old wicketkeeper David Williams held onto a neat catch. India’s hopes were pinned onto the sensational teenager from Bombay, Sachin Tendulkar, but unfortunately Sachin failed to live up to the expectations leaving India to a miserable 3/41. This was just the beginning of a nightmare ahead as Azhar headed back to the pavilion as the West Indies fielders were rejoicing with India at 4/58. Ravi Shastri was sleeping at one end and runs were hard to come by for the Indians but West Indies on the other hand were picking up wickets in a hurry. With all the four fast bowlers among the wickets, the Indian innings folded up for a paltry 126 after watching over 47 testing overs from the West Indies bowlers. Ravi Shastri was the top scorer with 33 from as many as 110 balls. For West Indies, Curtly Ambrose was giving away absolutely nothing to the opposition with figures of 8.4-3-9-2.

India also had four pace bowlers in their line up in Kapil, Prabhakar, Srinath and Banerjee. But are they as good as their counterparts were and even if they are, would a total of 126 be sufficient to defend? All the problems of the world were on the Indian skipper Md.Azharuddin’s head. But Kapil Dev and Manoj Prabhakar through their spirited opening burst gave India a semblance of hope in staying alive in the game. The W.A.C.A was now witnessing a procession of the West Indies batsmen go out in the middle and come back to the pavilion after a short stay at the crease. Only a fourth wicket partnership of two talented strokemakers Lara and Hooper looked prospective, but the Indian bowlers made sure the partnership was not more than 30 runs. Srinath and debutant Subroto Banerjee picked up five wickets among themselves as West Indies collapsed to 9/113. Anderson Cummins was displaying his allround abilities by playing some powerful shots and the match headed towards a tense finish. Problems and more problems were in store for Azhar as he ran out of overs from his quicks, with all the four pace bowlers exhausted of their 10 over quota. As a last throw of the dice, the Indian captain threw the ball to the confident kid Sachin Tendulkar. Just a single run was required for the West Indies now to scrape through a one wicket victory. Two slips were put up by Azhar hoping for an outside edge to land in their hands. Sachin Tendulkar bowled the best ball at the right time – a perfect outswinger and Cummins poked that and Azhar at second slip dived to his right to pull off one stupendous catch!!! A dejected Cummins had to depart but the Indians were jumping in excitement after ending this match as a TIE. Cummins was the highest scorer with 24 to his name and Subroto Banerjee, the most successful with 3/30.

Nothing could have been separated out of the two teams in that match and a Tie was just the fitting result on that night at the W.A.C.A. My statistician just reminds me that this was the third ODI ever to end in a Tie and Cricketfundas.com is pleased to have brought out the review of this nail biting match which happens to be the 692nd ODI in One Day Internationals history.

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