Playing It My Way: My Autobiography (16 page)

I turned down the offer. I was clear I wanted no distractions in the middle of a tournament. I did not want an alien element on my bat, something I had not come to terms with, to catch my eye while I was batting. It might have affected my rhythm. I said I would put a sticker on my bat when
I
wanted to and not when I was asked to do so. I had done well without a bat sticker up till then and, like most sportsmen (though not all care to acknowledge it), I was superstitious about such things. I did not want to risk making changes when I was batting well. The bat sticker could wait.

Towards the closing stages of the tournament, my friend and manager Mark Mascarenhas, head of the sports management company WorldTel, mentioned to me that he had lined up MRF, the well-known Indian car tyre brand, as a bat sponsor but the deal would only come into effect
after
the tournament. Mark, who was based in Connecticut and had made a name for himself by winning the television rights of the 1996 World Cup, knew my concerns well and never pushed me into doing anything against my wishes. His ability to understand and appreciate my issues made him a really special person. Mark was more a friend than a manager and I was able to trust him fully with all my needs. While he changed the nature of player endorsements in cricket by bringing a string of major corporates to the table, he did so without ever forcing a particular endorsement on me.

I first met Mark in Sri Lanka in 1995 and it was Ravi Shastri who introduced us. Ravi said to me that here was a man who could shake things up and had a very interesting proposition for me. As soon as I met him I was impressed by his professionalism and attention to detail. Mark never left anything to chance. We were really close and even went on a couple of family holidays together. On one of these holidays, to Coonoor in South India, we had a fantastic time eating all the local delicacies and playing golf. Mark was another foodie and I have fond memories of the many fantastic meals we had together in his house in Connecticut in 1998 when I spent a week there. I was totally shocked when I first heard about his fatal car accident at Kharbi, not far from Nagpur in central India in 2002, and must say I lost a very close friend and confidant. We worked wonderfully well together and it is impossible to fill the void created by his untimely death.

After Mark was gone a number of agents approached me and expressed an interest in managing my affairs. However, my relationship with Mark was such that it never occurred to me to leave WorldTel. And I am happy to say I have been proved right, with Vinod Naidu, my current manager and friend, taking care of my affairs for a decade and more, first on behalf of WorldTel and then on behalf of WSG (World Sport Group). I first met Vinod in Sharjah in 1998 and then in London over a delicious lunch at my favourite Thai restaurant, Patara, when Mark introduced the two of us. It was after Mark’s untimely demise that Vinod and I started working closely together. We spoke to each other regularly and, like Mark, Vinod soon came to understand and respect my concerns. It was always clear to him that my cricket was my top priority. Between Mark and Vinod, I have been lucky to have two great people to work with. In fact, it would perhaps not be wrong to say that I have spent more days with Vinod than anyone else in the professional realm over the last decade and I have enjoyed every bit of it. Vinod knows me inside out and has been a constant presence whenever I needed him. To spend so much time away from his family in order to manage my interests is evidence of his commitment to his profession, and his is another friendship I deeply cherish.

The quarter-final against Pakistan on 9 March 1996 was by far the biggest match of the World Cup. There was tremendous security around the team hotel and we knew that the nation would be watching. That was not so unusual for an India–Pakistan match, but the World Cup had added a further dimension to this particular knock-out encounter. On the day of the match we reached the ground early and found the atmosphere at the Chinnaswamy Stadium to be truly unbelievable. The stadium was packed hours before the game and the crowd was loud and boisterous.

We batted first and I was the first to get out for 31 to Ata-ur-Rehman, the Pakistan fast bowler, trying to steer the ball to third man. Navjot Sidhu, who opened the batting with me, batted well for his 93 and Ajay Jadeja played a fantastic cameo towards the end, scoring 45 off twenty-five balls to get us to a very respectable 287 in our fifty overs.

Pakistan started brightly in response and raced to 80 in their first ten overs. We badly needed a wicket to keep the scoring in check and that’s when a famous incident took place involving Aamer Sohail, the Pakistan opener, and Venkatesh Prasad, our fast-medium bowler. Sohail had hit Venky for a boundary towards point and suggested rather aggressively that that was where he wanted to keep Venky all day. He waved his bat towards the boundary and said a number of rather rude things. Venky, understandably angry, bowled him with his very next ball. It was sweet revenge. Having got his man, it was now his turn and he showed Aamer Sohail the way to the dressing room.

The team was pumped up after this incident and we soon took control of the match. Prasad picked up two more crucial wickets and Ajay Jadeja and I bowled ten reasonably tight overs between us in the middle, while Kumble chipped in with three wickets. In what turned out to be his final international innings, Javed Miandad was run out for 38, ending a glorious career for Pakistan. Despite some good late hitting by wicketkeeper Rashid Latif, which caused us a bit of a panic, we were on the ascendancy throughout and in the end won the match fairly comfortably, by 39 runs, prompting celebrations all over the country.

On our way back to the hotel we could see people lining the streets and they were throwing garlands and flowers at the team bus. In the hotel too we were being treated differently. We stayed on in Bangalore for one extra day and spent a relaxed few hours in the pool the next afternoon. We could sense that the staff were trying to please us and were looking at us differently. They were looking after our every need and when somebody ordered prawns, three different varieties were served, all on the house. We were being treated like royalty and it felt wonderful to see the country so happy and proud.

We were due to play Sri Lanka in the semi-final at Eden Gardens on 13 March. We arrived in Kolkata two days before and the first thing that struck us on landing at the airport was the security. There were commandos everywhere and no fans were allowed near the hotel lobby. This was no ordinary match.

Someone had mentioned to us that the surface at Eden Gardens had been relaid with soil brought over from Australia. The first look at the surface seemed to support this statement, with the pitch apparently hard and firm. In fact, it did look like a typical Australian wicket. On that basis, it was unanimously decided that we should field first if we won the toss, particularly because Sri Lanka had chased very well throughout the tournament. Their openers, Sanath Jayasuriya and Romesh Kaluwitharana, had been going for the bowling in the first fifteen overs and had given them fantastic starts in most matches. They had beaten us in the pool stage of the competition and it was important to take early wickets and put them under pressure.

We won the toss and put the Sri Lankans in and got off to a great start, picking up Sanath for one and Kalu for zero. They both got out playing cut shots to third man, vindicating our belief that the wicket was hard and firm. It was only when I came on to bowl that I realized we had misread the wicket. The ball started to hold up and was stopping on the batsmen. The top layer might have been firm enough, but immediately below the surface it was loose. It would clearly not last the full hundred overs and it became even more important to keep Sri Lanka down to a manageable score. Though we managed to restrict Sri Lanka to 251 in their fifty overs, that proved far too many in the end.

When it was our turn to bat the wicket had started doing all sorts of things. The ball was turning and holding up and batting was extremely difficult. Opening, I scored 65 but got out rather strangely to a ball from Sanath Jayasuriya. He was bowling left-arm orthodox spin and the ball hit my pad and rolled off to the on side. I thought there was a quick single and stepped out of the crease. Too late, I saw that the ball had stopped very close to Kaluwitharana, the keeper, and there was no way I could finish the run, but by then it was too late. He dislodged the stumps in a flash and I didn’t bother waiting for the third umpire’s decision because I knew I was out. It was a long and frustrating walk back to the pavilion and I could sense it would not be easy for the batsmen who followed.

Sure enough, we soon lost wickets in a heap, handing Sri Lanka the game. The crowd, desperate for an Indian victory, grew increasingly restless and disrupted the game by throwing things onto the field. By then, however, the match was all over. Our World Cup dream lay shattered and there was a deathly silence in the dressing room.

This time the journey from the ground to the hotel was painful and when we reached the hotel we realized that everything had changed. We were made to feel as if we had done something seriously wrong. There was no doubt we had let our fans down, but we were hurting as much as anybody. It was a long and difficult night as we sat around picking over the way the match had played out.

We left Kolkata by the first available flight the following morning and I still found it difficult to accept that Sri Lanka and not India would be travelling to Pakistan to play in the World Cup final against Australia. We had done so well to win the quarter-final against Pakistan, the high point of our World Cup. Personally, I had had a good tournament and ended up with the most runs in the competition – 523, with two centuries and three half-centuries – but that was of little consolation. Our biggest mistake was misreading the Eden Gardens pitch. That is what cost us the game.

Indian cricket was not going through a good phase. With the World Cup dream over, team morale was low and we had little time to recover before a difficult tour of England, which we lost 1–0, though we did discover two superb talents in Rahul Dravid and Sourav Ganguly along the way. Though I scored a couple of centuries in this series, at Edgbaston and Trent Bridge, and Sourav scored two consecutive hundreds, on debut at Lord’s and at Trent Bridge, we weren’t able to make our way back after losing the first of the three Tests. The England bowlers, led by Chris Lewis, Dominic Cork and Alan Mullally, did well throughout the series and run-scoring was never easy. Nasser Hussain, the England skipper, also had a good series, leading from the front all the way.

Off the pitch, one incident from this tour is difficult to forget. Sourav Ganguly and Navjot Sidhu were travelling on the Tube in London when a few young guys, who’d probably had a bit too much to drink, boarded the train. For some reason they started making gestures at Sourav and Navjot and eventually one of them threw a beer can at Navjot, who promptly stood up to confront them. It turned ugly and a fight ensued, until the train reached the next station, where their attackers staggered off – but then one of them came back onto the train and started waving a gun at Navjot. At this, Sourav’s first reaction was to drop to the ground and cover his face in fright, but then he started pleading with the boy and dragged Navjot away as quickly as he could. Looking back at the incident, it seems a funny scene in some ways, but it must have been pretty scary at the time!

Soon after returning to India after a generally disappointing tour of England on the field, I was made captain of India at the age of twenty-three, replacing Azhar, who had been captain since 1990. It was time for the team to make a fresh start and get back to winning ways as soon as possible.

6th match. India v Kenya at Cuttack. 18 February 1996

Kenya 199–6 (50/50 ov); India 203–3 (41.5/50 ov)

India won by 7 wickets (with 49 balls remaining)

10th match. India v West Indies at Gwalior. 21 February 1996

West Indies 173 (50/50 ov); India 174–5 (39.4/50 ov)

India won by 5 wickets (with 62 balls remaining)

19th match. India v Australia at Mumbai. 27 February 1996

Australia 258 (50/50 ov); India 242 (48/50 ov)

Australia won by 16 runs

24th match. India v Sri Lanka at Delhi. 2 March 1996

India 271–3 (50/50 ov); Sri Lanka 272–4 (48.4/50 ov)

Sri Lanka won by 6 wickets (with 8 balls remaining)

29th match. India v Zimbabwe at Kanpur. 6 March 1996

India 247–5 (50/50 ov); Zimbabwe 207 (49.4/50 ov)

India won by 40 runs

2nd quarter-final. India v Pakistan at Bangalore. 9 March 1996

India 287–8 (50/50 ov); Pakistan 248–9 (49/49 ov)

India won by 39 runs

1st semi-final. India v Sri Lanka at Kolkata. 13 March 1996

Sri Lanka 251–8 (50/50 ov); India 120–8 (34.1/50 ov)

Sri Lanka won by default

Final. Australia v Sri Lanka at Lahore. 17 March 1996

Australia 241–7 (50/50 ov); Sri Lanka 245–3 (46.2/50 ov)

Sri Lanka won by 7 wickets (with 22 balls remaining)

1st Test. Birmingham. 6–9 June 1996

India 214 (J Srinath 52,
SR Tendulkar 24
; DG Cork 4–61) and 219 (
SR Tendulkar 122
; CC Lewis 5–72)

England 313 (N Hussain 128; BKV Prasad 4–71, J Srinath 4–103) and 121–2 (MA Atherton 53*)

England won by 8 wickets

2nd Test. Lord’s. 20–24 June 1996

England 344 (RC Russell 124, GP Thorpe 89; BKV Prasad 5–76) and 278–9 dec (AJ Stewart 66; A Kumble 3–90)

India 429 (SC Ganguly 131, R Dravid 95,
SR Tendulkar 31
; AD Mullally 3–71)