It is July the 13th 2002. Lords Cricket Ground, London. India vs. England in the Natwest tri-Series final. It is really late in India. Zaheer Khan is about to face Andrew Flintoff with 2 required off 4 deliveries. It has come down to this in a chase of 326. Wait but why is he, a number 10 batsman on strike? And why is Andrew Flintoff bowling the final over? Why is the established batsman Mohammad Kaif on the non-strikers end? If you were alive and were in India at this moment, you probably know what is about to happen next. But to truly understand why this moment is about to change Indian cricket forever, we need to do a deep rewind.
India and England have a troublesome history. If you have ever managed to be in a history class, you know what I mean. But one of the things the British left in the Indian sub-continent was cricket. And cricket blossomed. India picked up on cricket and produced some fascinating cricketers over the years. England was always one of the main powerhouses of cricket. Despite of that, India had already managed to win a world-cup back in 1983 while England were still trophy less. But that world cup victory for India was labeled as a 'come from behind underdog' story. And it has been 19 years since then. What was the main thing separating the two sides? Money.
India at that point was still considered a nation that did not have the same kind of money in cricket. This was a pre-advertising era and hence most of the money that boards made came from the broadcasting and sponsors. Indian cricket team sponsor was paying a paltry 10 Lakhs (adjusted for inflation) to the BCCI for a match, chunk of which had to be spent in maintaining and building the sports infrastructure in the country which was nowhere close to world class. England was at the other end of the spectrum. They had an established architecture from around 150 years and even their regular county cricketers were being paid at the same pay scale as some of the Indian players were. They had better training facilities, they had better grounds and better coaching staff.
Then what did India have? And how were they in the final then? Most of that credit goes to one man. Sachin Tendulkar. And it was not even an overstatement. He was single handedly winning games. Making bowlers like Shane Warne and Glen Mcgrath look like country club bolwers. Sachin was scoring faster, at a better average and scoring more centuries than anyone else in the world in those years. And how did they do when he didn't do well? Between the two world cups of 1996 and 1999, India were a really bad ODI side. And especially a terrible side batting second. In that four year span other than the games against Zimbabwe and Bangladesh, India only won 2 games while chasing when Sachin Tendulkar did not score a 50. So they were heavily reliant on him as a batsman. There were two rising stars in Rahul Dravid and Sourav Ganguly but the Indian supporters did not watch a game after Tendulkar was dismissed.
India also had a lot of off-field troubles in the last few years. They had a captaincy crisis after Azharuddin lost his form. In those moments of panic, they decided to turn to their best batsman, Sachin Tendulkar. And it was a debacle. Twice. He was made captain with high expectations in 1996 and the team almost lost everything in the next year. They reinstated Azhar but then he got caught in the match-fixing scandal and Sachin had to take over the captaincy yet again, to much reluctance. And it was again a very poor show. Sachin has one of the worst win-loss records for an Indian captain of the modern era. India did not taste any victory since the 1998 dessert storm of Sachin Tendulkar in Sharjah for the next 2 years. In 2000, India found Sourav Ganguly.
Sourav Ganguly as a captain had a strong backing from the then BCCI boss, Jagmohan Dalmiya. It was a vision they both shared. A vision of rising up the ladder of international cricket with talent and domination. Sourav Ganguly was given a free reign to run the team and one of the 1st things he did was to burst the young talent on the scene. He was not afraid of the over exposure, the inexperience. People called him head strong. Told him that was not what Indian culture stood for. That things were meant to be polite and in order. But he did not care. He built a core around Virender Sehwag, Yuvraj Singh, Rahul Dravid, Zaheer Khan with him and Sachin keeping the team together. He did not believe in hierarchy. And it started to pay off. India started winning games again with his form getting better day by day. It was under his captaincy that India scored their famous 2001 test series win against Australia at home with the match at Eden being immortalised by VVS and Dravid.
India decided to play a tri-series in summer of 2002 with England and Sri Lanka. And the series seemed to have a very familiar story. India relying on the bat of Sachin Tendulkar who topped the run scoring charts again. India dropped just one game in the entire series with comfortably beating Sri Lanka and that single loss came against England at The Oval. So when they went into the final all the expectations were on the top heavy Indian batting line up. And India found themselves at 146/5 in the chase with the entire top order that shored the side all series long gone, back into the pavilion. Sourav Ganguly and Sehwag did score quickly to take the score to 100/1 but then India lost the plot. And with Sachin getting out when the score was 146 to Ashley Giles, the doom was all but sure for India who were on course to losing their 6th final in the last year. Indian viewers back home switched off the TV. Went to bed. But why were they chasing 325?
Most of the story till this point of the day was dominated by one man. The captain of the English cricket team, Nasser Hussain. Nasser was a very blessed cricketer and leadership came naturally to him. He was particularly successful in tests over the last 2 years with England virtually staying undefeated in that period except, to India in a test series away. But his ODI captaincy and batting was under severe criticism. For some time before the game, Hussain's insistence of batting at number three and even his inclusion in the team had been repeatedly questioned by several members of the press, most notably Sky Sports commentators (and Hussain's future colleagues) Ian Botham and Bob Willis. And they were not wrong. He was averaging under 30 with a sub 90 SR in the entire year before this game with not a single hundred in this time. And he picked this game to silence everyone. He scored 115 with a 186 run partnership with Marcus Trescothick. This ended up being his highest score in the ODIs. He made sure everyone in the world saw him score that hundred. It was one of the most flawless ODI innings anybody had ever seen. And then he had Trescothick with him who was also probably having the best time of his career in the limited overs game, going neck to neck in runs and hundreds scored in the series with Sachin. Even though they started scoring slowly, they picked up the pace after Nick Knight was dismissed. Nasser and Trescothick put up 186 runs for the second wicket. And then walked in Andrew Flintoff.
Andrew Flintoff was rising to be one of the best all-round talents the game had seen along with Jacques Kallis. He could bowl 140 kmph+ with ease and regularly scored match defining innings. He played well in both formats. And then he also had that attitude of never giving up. And then just a few months before, in the last game of the ODI series back in India, he helped to level the series by bowling England to an unforgettable last ball finish. He celebrated by removing his shirt and waving it around at Wankhede, Mumbai. When he walked in that day, the score was 227/2. And by the time he left, it was 307. He and Nasser had added 80 runs in under 10 overs which for those years way more than teams scored. Although aided by some really poor bowling England reached a mammoth total of 325, which was the highest total on that ground in the modern ODI era. England went in the break confident of having India on the ropes.
After Sachin fell in the chase, out walked a 23 year old Mohammad Kaif from Allahabad, Uttar Pradesh. This was his 1st tour. He had never been outside the country. But he was god gifted with speed and agility which he used to perfection while fielding. No one in India knew what good fielding was. Mohammad Kaif walked into the team and along with Yuvraj Singh started saving runs, taking brilliant catches to finally show how it is supposed to be done. He also was a very calm and composed character and also someone who knew how to deal with responsibilities. Two years ago, he had led India to an Under-19 World cup victory. But his batting in the big boys' club was yet to be proven. He had an average of 27 at that point with very little accomplishments to his name till that point. He was joining Yuvraj Singh at the crease.
Yuvraj Singh was born to play cricket and he was unstoppable since the moment he walked on the field. He was part of the Indian squad that won the Under-19 world cup in 2000 and was awarded the player of the tournament for his all-round performance. he was straight away drafted into the senior team. Even though he started with a bang, his performances dwindled. He was subsequently dropped a few months ago only to make a return for this series as another chance to prove his might.
Yuvraj and Kaif decided to take the game in blocks. 5 overs at a time. Lords is a beautiful ground but with weird dimensions. The mid-wicket boundary takes some effort to clear. But very few boundaries can stop Yuvraj when he decides to clear them and when he did in the 34th over to complete 200 runs for India, Indian camp seemed interested. With calculated risks and effortless scoring India crossed 250 too with the pair still at the crease. But India still needed around 80 runs in the final 10 overs. As said before, something that did not happen very often. Definitely not twice in a day. But the duo was relentless. The ran hard, put the bad balls away and just simply refused to give up, like the Indian team did usually with a person not named Sachin Tendulkar at the crease. Mohammad Kaif completed his half century with now 60 runs needed off the last 57 balls. Their strategy of taking the game in small blocks seemed to work.
Right after Kaif reached his 50, Yuvraj Singh top edged for Collingwood to take a catch at fine leg. England breathed a sigh of relief but were still frustrated at this resistance that they did not expect. Even the commentators were vocally upset at the fact that England bowlers were letting this go on. Harbhajan Singh arrived at the crease, who was having a gala time with the bowl in the last few months. The Eden test talked about before? He took hat-trick in that game to finish it for India. But he needed to bat. And not just stand, but actively score runs. He did his job by scoring a maximum and then rotating the strike to give Mohammad Kaif ample opportunities to score which he did not miss on.
Harbhajan was cleaned up in the 48th over with still 14 runs required by none other than Andrew Flintoff. England feeling confident again as they now had the chance to bowl at the incoming tail enders of India who were not prepared to bat in situations like these. Anil Kumble walked out and was dismissed in two balls. At the end of the 48th over India were 315/8 with still 11 required of 12 balls.
Darren Gough would have won this game for England in his sleep at this point if not for an umpiring decision around the 33rd over. Around the 33rd over, Steve Bucknor decided the ball was disfigured and decided to replace it with a harder and newer ball which meant there was no scope for any reverse swing. Reverse swing was Darren Gough's most lethal weapon and with the slinging action, very few could pick it off his hand, let alone Indian tail-enders. But that wasn't meant to be. And he was there bowling the 49th over, with ball not reversing. And he couldn't get Zaheer Khan, the new batsman out. Zaheer Khan didn't have a good game until that point as he was thrashed around by both Nasser Hussain and Marcus Trescothick in the first half. He managed to take a few singles and finally getting Kaif on strike for the final delivery.
Mohammad Kaif had a choice at this ball. India needed 6 runs off 7 deliveries. He could either take a single and retain the strike or go for the glory shot. But with Flintoff steaming in from the other end, he did not want to leave too much for the last over. He decided to go for it and did not connect. But managed to get a healthy outside edge which flew over the third man for a boundary leaving 2 to get off the final over.
This looks easier said than done. Zaheer Khan is not a batsman. Mohammad Kaif has no experience of being in these situations. Their fans back home have given up on them and gone to sleep in agony believing they have lost. The young team doesn't have much on their resumé to boast about in situations like these. Zaheer took the 1st ball for a dot. Then on the next ball, the ball was going down the leg side and he attempted to tickle it but failed. Despite not being confident, everyone appealed for it. But the umpire decided it was off the hip. He lived another ball. And here we are. 3rd ball of the 50th over of one of the most exciting ODIs till date. Andrew Flintoff charging in needing two good deliveries to get two wickets. Perhaps another opportunity to take off his shirt and celebrate at the Meccah of cricket. An opportunity to etch the name in the history of cricket forever. Or will an Indian team that was learning how to chase a target without Sachin Tendulkar going to win this? Was the Indian team going to play spoilsport in Nasser Hussain's best ODI so far? Was Sourav Ganguly going to have his revenge? Only the next ball can tell.
Welcome to a moment in history.
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