In what was a spectacular all round performance by the Men in Blue, there were a few moments worth remembering. This blog post will mostly be about those moments which made us jump, made us want to throw stuff at our players, made us immensely proud of them, made us feel angry, made us proud of India, made us smile so broad that anybody looking at us would call us weird (not that I care!), made us race back to hostel after the match with such speed that it surprised even us (Okay, that applies only to me!), made us unbelievably patriotic.
Bhuvaneshwar Kumar's spell: You can just keep bowling and keep surprising the top most batsmen in the world, can't you? You played with the ball, swung it beautifully and scared the living hell out of the English top order. If I was asked to name one emerging pace bowler with a lot of potential and future, I would most definitely name you.
Ravindra Jadeja's double wicket over: Jadeja, you needed only a few days to shut all the critics and make thousands of fans scream your name out. The bowling was impeccable and Patel and Kieswetter were in for major shocks as they totally misread his deliveries. The former was waved goodbye after a stunning delivery, catching him off guard, hitting his pad while the latter just gaped at the bowler and then at the stumps as he stood there, totally missing the length. Jadeja has decided that he has had enough from the fans and from the critics. He proved them wrong, both with the bat and the ball in the previous match and with the stunning 6 over spell in this match.
Rahane's stump goes for a walk: Steven Finn, you continue to amaze me. Your height, your yorkers, your well-planned bouncers remind me of Lee and Shoaib. My heart does the exact same step with these three bowlers, hence the comparision. Rahane, you deserved that "off stump going for a walk" (run, rather!) thing because to face a bowler as fast and lethal as Finn, you need confidence, which you clearly miss.
Virat's cover drives: I was bowled. He was pure bliss to watch. The first two boundaries were rusty and the placements were a bit off. But the cover drive just made up for those two shots. It did not end there. Your confidence grew and you were more sensible in your shot selection. Then, there was the huge bouncer which you tried to duck, but unfortunately, Finn, the hulk was much taller and the bouncer was way too into the body to miss and you drew your bat out in the last moment, which propelled the ball over the keeper, towards the boundary. But what I loved the most was the difference in the way you looked at the whole innings. It was a welcome change to see cheeky grins and wide smiles instead of your usual cuss words.
Overall, we saw a fine game of cricket played at Ranchi today, what with the newly inaugurated stadium and the insane people (some of them hanging from trees to catch a glimpse of the match!).
This is one game which made me think, "There you go, losers. This is for all those people who failed to support India when they were going through a tough phase."
It is not the support that they receive at times of their glory that matters, what matters is the trust and comfort they receive at times of failure and distress.
- Forever a cricket fan,
Aishwarya Kumar.
