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T20WC India-Pak encounter: How India turned blue with failure and green with envy

Meenakshi Rao

India’s cricket preparedness, rating and performance often gets wrapped in neon lighted figment of achievement, something that gets propelled more by the sense of entitlement to the pedestal than by reality checks.

Sunday in Dubai was just that rare kind of reality check that was imposed upon Virat Kohli’s team by Babar Azam and his band of fierce performers who throttled a lionized Men in Blue with a resounding 10-wicket win.

This had never happened to both the teams. Pakistan had never registered a 10-wicket win on any team in the T20 format. India had never been trounced with such completeness. So when the shock, disbelief and the heartbreak of the India-Pak encounter at the T20 World Cup receded, one thing stayed – and will stay for a long time to come – not just in the Indian dressing room which incidentally includes MS Dhoni, but among all cricketing fans – the need to stop lionizing the expectations from this team.

 

Let’s go by the facts first. This dispensation has not won a T20 World Cup in the last six editions, except for 2014. This dispensation is talked about as a heady mix of experience and youth. That brings us to the reality that the team has six members who are 30 plus and another six who are baby starters in the game. Too much experience equals fatigue and too little, risk. On Sunday, both ends of the dispensation showed up with inherent loopholes and were hollered by their arch rivals.

It is Kohli’s self-announced last T20 event as a skipper. Rohit Sharma, the master batsman has peaked long back and cannot be expected to remain on the summit for much too long. K L Rahul, otherwise known as a consummate destroyer when he gets going, not always gets going. Rishabh Pant has learned nothing about the cause of stability from the 2019 World Cup semi final encounter against New Zealand where his youthful zeal contributed to a loss.

Against Pakistan on Sunday, he had the hearts of the viewers in their mouth as he sported audacity in a situation where caution could have been more profitable for a staggering team.

Now let’s come to Mohammed Shami and the team management’s yeomen blunder in including him over Shardul. And this is no hindsight observation. Shardul has been the performer in recent times and that’s the reason why he replaced Axar Patel in the squad. For now, he has the X factor, and has been delivering. He should have been there for encountering Pakistan instead of a known run-giver Shami.

The way Shami was hammered spoke volumes not just about the fierce performance of Pakistan openers Azam and Rizwan but, more importantly, of the miscalculation in squad selection as also of the chink in the arm department of the team.

 

Just compare the arm department of Pakistan with India. Bumrah is a world class bowler we sport with pride. But it was Shaheen Afridi, the tall pathan who seared through the famed Rohit, Rahul, Virat trio with his fierce and dazzling swingers which none in the Indian squad could show up. At best, Bumrah controlled some runs for some time. Rest were ripped and wrapped up by the Pak openers with a dismissive irreverence which hurt, and will continue to do so.

Besides suffering the ignominy of being handed over a 10-wicket loss by an arch rival which had never been able to defeat India in an ICC tournament except for the Champions Trophy event once, the most alarming fact now is that Virat is in a corner and if the team gets defeated by New Zealand next, India will be all but out of the tournament.

And, as one shocked cricket-football enthusiast suffering a double whammy of India losing to Pak and Liverpool handing over a 5-goal loss to Manchester United at home despite the presence of Ronaldo, said, “now even Afghanistan will fancy their chances in the group seeing India as an unprepared and easy pick”.

Yes, post defeat observations can be as unrealistic as the worth of a home team, but a 10-wicket loss is unjustified, incredible and a big hammer smash on the psyche of a cricket worshipping nation like India where money, apparatus, infrastructure and presence are an omnipresent grid from which the cricketing 11 draw sustenance, reputation and a plush living.

Yes, one defeat should not sound the death knell in the assessment of any team. But then, what happened at Dubai on Sunday does not allow too much room to be indulgent.

Now about the Pakistan squad. These have been mercurial beings from across the border for any number of years. But, on Sunday, it was least about mercury and most about balance, passion and performance in a heady mix.

Pakistan has been denied international matches on its home ground for a number of years, thanks to its political dispensation being often identified with terror and violence, so much so that they often get consumed by it. No team wants to risk it on Pakistani ground.

Cornered by their political realities and the terror vulnerability that the nation lives with, its gifted cricketers have been polishing their skills away from the gaze in domestic cricket. That includes polishing as well as nurturing new blood into the game. Babar, Rizwan, Shaheen are just a few of the spokes in this great Pakistani wheel. This Sunday, the victory was wrested from India by just these three performers.

Not that Pakistan has given up on mercury and the instability that it brings to any visitation. But now it is just one of the many more useful, stable and happening factors that this new squad brings to the middle.

Compare that with India and you will not find a match – either in the passion, pace or the fierceness of intent. Perhaps, that’s the drawback veteran-ism and lionization inserts into the proceedings.