Memories Of Greatest Cricketers - - #8 Shane Warne

[Murali Srinivas]

1992 World Cup

It had many firsts to its credit.

South Africa played its first World Cup.

Round robin League was followed for the first time, in the sense that every team played every other team. That means the strength of each team could be judged.

Coloured clothing was used for the first time.

Day Night matches were played for the first time in WC under floodlights.

Pinch hitting was put to use for the first time and the term coined, with Martin Crowe taking the credit.

Spinner opened the bowling. Off Spinner Deepak Patel of NewZealand (again thanks to M.Crowe) got the honours.

When the tournament started there was not even a hint that Pak would win. The only celebrity who predicted a Pak win was our Sunil Gavaskar and he was felicitated in a function held in Pakistan after the Cup was won.

Since it was a round robin league, every team had to play 8 matches and initially it looked Pak would be eliminated. They lost their opening match to WI by 10 wickets. The WI, now under Richie Richardson chased a score of 220 odd without wicket loss. Lara had to retire hurt after he nearly scored a century. Though Pak beat Zimbawae, they came totally unstruck against England and were shot out for 74. Imran did not play this match and Javed led in his absence. But for tail enders swinging their bat, Pak would have been still worse. Engalnd in their reply were 24 for 1, when rain interupted and play was washed out. There was no rest day provision and Pakistan who was staring at certain defeat escaped with 1 point.

Then came the crucial match. India vs Pak [March 4th,1992] at Sydney. The sub continent rivals were facing each other for the first time in a World Cup. India won the toss and elected to bat. Imran was back for this match and he opened up with Wasim and Aquib. Both were breathing fire and Aquib was simply unplayable. Srikanth was all at sea [I have never seen Srikanth "thadavify" so badly before]. His agony ended soon. Azhar came in at no 3 and he Ajay Jadeja steadied the innings before Azhar fell. Vinod Kambli who was specially flown in came next. [India were touring Australia and the team stayed back there. Kambli joined the team]. Kambli was good though he consumed more balls [By today's standard, the no of balls would be huge]. Jadeja's fall brought the two buddies together and at one stage it looked it would be a smooth affair when Kambli in trying to give a charge to Mustaq Ahamed fell. With Sanjay Manjerekar falling immediately, India was again pushed back. But Kapil gave good support to Sachin and we could cross 200. We finished at 216 with Sachin unbeaten on 54. For people who were following the game, it is still a mystery why play was stopped after 49 overs. We had a doubt whether it would be enough?

Pak innings was rocked back by Kapil and Manoj Prabakar. With Inzy falling to Kapil, Prabakar accounted for Zahid Faisal [This is one guy who was spoken highly by Imran but who failed to live up to the hype] and Pak were 2 down for less than 20. Now aamir Sohail and Javed slowly started to bring them out of trouble. Javed was not his usual self but he fished, missed, scratched around. Readers who had seen the live relay would remember one thing. Javed was complaining of back pain and was using runner. There was one moment when Venkatapathy Raju was bowling and Javed in trying to cut him missed it and wk Kiran More went up and down in glee claiming for a catch but that was disallowed. Javed on seeing this started jumping like a fox, making fun of More and that started a war of words and even the calm Azhar had a heated exchange with Javed. The partnership was almost worth 100 runs when Azhar ran in a change that turned the course of the match. Ball was handed over to Sachin and Aamir sohail in trying hit against the spin on the leg side scooped up and Srikanth at cover completed a low catch. Salim Malik who came in started with a flourish and hit two boundaries. Manoj was brought back and his ball moving away caught the thin edge and for the first time I saw a Pakistani batsman walking back without waiting for the umpire.

Imran came in and by this time the noose was getting tightened. He couldn't open his account and in desperation and confusion (because of the runner) saw V.Raju rearranging the stumps, while he could not reach the crease in time. Wasim the other danger man stepped out to Raju to miss it completely and More did the rest. Te next over saw Srinath breaching the defence of Javed and it was but over. Moin Khan and Mustaq tried to delay the inevitable but Pak was all out for 173 and we won by 43 runs.

The next match for Pak was with South Africa. SA batting first scored around 210 and odd. Pakistan in its reply started well and after the openers fell, Inzy and Imran did a good job and Pak were cruising at one stage. Readers would remember one photo which was a photgrapher's dream picture. Inzy hit the ball hard and ran but Jhonty Rhodes sprung from nowhere and stopped the ball and while he was still airborne, threw down the stumps to run out Inzy. That photo is still a collector's dream and got published everywhere. Rain interuptions made the targets to get revised but SA romped home. With just one victory and three defeats and one near defeat, Pakistan was staring at elimination with just 3 points against its name at the end of 5 matches.

That was when Imran the leader emerged.

Regards