SWEET SMELL OF SUCCESS
THERE WERE SOME STAR TURNS—FROM PUJARA AND BUMRAH AND KOHLI—BUT THIS COVETED OVERSEAS SERIES VICTORY IN AUSTRALIA WAS ALSO ABOUT TEAM INDIA’S UNRELENTING INTENSITY
INDIA HAD JUST RETURNED from South Africa in February 2017 and all the buzz was about a 5-1 one day international (ODI) series win against the Proteas. But Captain Kohli, who’d batted like a man possessed, was restrained in celebration. Reason: a Test series victory in South Africa had proved elusive. It had looked within grasp: there had been some excellent bowling performances but the batting was a let-down. Kohli was aware of this, but he also knew that he now had an unorthodox fast bowler who could turn a Test match on its head inside a session. “AB DeVilliers told me (Jasprit) Bumrah was the most difficult bowler he’d faced on that tour. He generated awkward bounce and left the batsman very little time. In conditions that help fast bowling, he can be a real match-winner,” said Kohli, when we met in Kolkata a month after the South Africa tour. With Mohammed Shami and Ishant Sharma also in the mix, Kohli’s ‘Mission Overseas’, fast turning into an “obsession” in his own words, seemed achievable when the team travelled to England in July 2018.
England, however, didn’t go according to plan. In the first Test at Edgbaston in Birmingham, India forsook the solidity of Cheteshwar Pujara at No. 3 to accommodate a fifth bowler. The team couldn’t chase 194 in the fourth
“We were determined to do well in Australia. All of us were hurting after England” —Ravi Shastri, Head Coach
innings. Kohli again was stellar, but he had no support. This was the leitmotif of the tour despite the odd contribution from Pujara and Rahane; Virat stood out as the lone warrior with the bat. And despite a creditable bowling performance, India received a 1-4 series drubbing, raising questions about the team’s prospects in overseas conditions and Kohli’s ability to pick the right team in conditions unfamiliar to him and the team.
“We met at the end of the last Test in England and Ravi [Shastri, head coach] asked everyone how it was that smart men continued to make the same mistakes,” reminisces Bharat Arun, the bowling coach. “And when we landed in Australia, Shastri said to the bowlers: ‘I hope you’ve left your driving licences back home’,” laughs Arun, explaining he meant that “Bumrah and the pace trio wouldn’t give the Australian batsmen anything at driving length”.
In any case, the bowling department looked more settled; it was the batting that was worrisome: it couldn’t again be Kohli and Kohli alone. Enter Pujara. For years now, Pujara had been the batting mainstay in Tests, in home conditions. And as Chairman of Selectors MSK Prasad says, “he has this ability to go into a trance the moment he walks out to bat. Whatever you throw at him, he is unfazed. That’s what we needed from him in Australia.”
With Bumrah bowling at a consistent 145 kmph, making the Australian batsmen hop and jump uncertainly, and picking up key wickets at regular intervals, all Virat needed from his team were a few key knocks to keep the batting together. “In Adelaide, when we were four down for 40, Pujara played a brilliant hand,” says vice-captain Ajinkya Rahane. “He has tons of patience and can bat all day. The way he played with the tail was fantastic, and it was because he got a big hundred that we could eke out a first innings lead.”
Shastri gushes: “Pujara proved that 10 hours at the crease can be glamorous. You want someone to bat for your life? Pick this man!” Pujara, the Man of the Series, the man at the centre of all this adulation, is mainly relieved at the end of it all. “We were determined to do well in Australia. All of us were hurting after England,” he says. “We had to score good runs. There were days when we didn’t get more than 200, like at the MCG (Melbourne Cricket Ground). In fact, at first sight, getting to 300 looked difficult on the MCG wicket. Batting was grinding hard work, but we were determined to not fritter it away. We’d learnt from our mistakes in England and South Africa. I have to say it’s the best feeling ever.”
“At the end of Day 4 in Melbourne, none of us could sleep. The weather forecast predicted rain on the fifth day, and the possibility of being rained out was giving the team nightmares. With two Australian wickets still remaining, and the first session of Day 5 washed out, I was praying for the ordeal to end: the gods couldn’t be so unkind, I remember thinking. A washout here would’ve meant it was still 1-1; all the hard work would be lost,” recounts Shastri. “In the dressing room, we were all fidgety; all we wanted was to go out and finish it off,” echoes the captain.
It has been said before, but the magic ingredient of success is often not star power but this kind of unrelenting intensity. Bowling fast and furious (as Bumrah did) and batting with dogged determination and concentration in trying conditions (like Pujara) count no doubt, but so does the taut focus of the team. That’s the new Indian team, and Kohli can justly take credit for leading it by example.
The pursuit of that elusive overseas victory started in South Africa. It was unfinished business coming to Australia and that box has finally been checked after a seemingly endless wait. “That ‘overseas’ bogey can now be packed off and sent home,” says Shastri. “It won’t return to haunt us.” In the afterglow of this famous victory, the halo around the Indian line-up—of Bumrah, Shami, Sharma, Kuldeep Yadav and Ravindra Jadeja, not to forget R Ashwin, among the bowlers; and Kohli, Pujara, Rahane and Rishabh Pant, not to forget young Mayank Agarwal, among the batsmen— looks all too real. It’s no surprise that India will end the year as the world’s No.1 Test team for the third year in a row.
What about Captain Kohli? What will he take home from this victory? Easily the best batsman in the world across formats, he was understandably not happy in England, as his leadership instincts came back into question. On the evening of India’s win in Australia, we bumped into each other at the team hotel as he and his wife, actor Anushka Sharma, were leaving for an engagement. The relief and joy on his face were palpable: you could see Kohli was at peace; he’d finally ticked the ‘overseas’ box.
But he is not one to rest on his recently won laurels. His insatiable hunger for runs is matched by an appetite for success as captain. Kohli, who calls himself “a hero at personal convenience”, is already adjusting his vision to a new focus. Australia has been conquered, but a World Cup trophy, up for grabs come July 14, 2019, at Lord’s, has swum into focus. In the matter-of-fact spirit of a team that has come to trust in its ability to win consistently, coach Shastri says: “Red-ball cricket is done for the moment. It’s time to fine tune the white-ball team; we have a real chance to do well in England during the World Cup.” Can they do it? Kohli and his youthful team certainly give hope and also hold out the promise that a less-than-perfect outcome will not be
for lack of self-belief or trying.