Playing It My Way: My Autobiography (53 page)

We struck back in the Australian second innings and reduced them to 27–4, with Umesh Yadav taking three of those wickets. Then Ponting and Michael Hussey came together in what turned out to be a game-breaking partnership of 115. We had one final opportunity when Hussey was out on the fourth morning for 89, reducing Australia to 197–9. At that point the lead was less than 250 and we still had a realistic chance of winning the match. But a 43-run last-wicket partnership between Hilfenhaus and Pattinson took it out of our reach and Australia went 1–0 up in the series.

The Sydney Test was even more disappointing. The wicket had a lot of grass and Australia won the toss and decided to bowl, which is unusual for an Australian team at home. They took full advantage of the conditions and bowled us out for only 191 on the first day. I scored 41 before dragging a James Pattinson delivery on to my stumps. We did well at the start of the Australian innings and had them at 37–3, but then we lost our way. Batting in much-improved conditions on days two and three, Australia went on to run up a very big score, with skipper Michael Clarke contributing a triple hundred to their 659, and this left us two whole days to bat to save the match.

Batting for two days was difficult but not impossible. At the end of day three, I was unbeaten on eight, having faced forty deliveries. I was batting to a plan and was determined to leave everything outside off stump. It had got a little cloudy in the evening and with Ben Hilfenhaus and Peter Siddle bowling really well, I was satisfied to survive the last hour so that I could resume the following morning.

Before I walked out to bat on the fourth day, our masseur Amit Shah wished me luck and I said to him that he should get ready to keep me going for two days. I knew that if I did so I would be able to save the game, and if the 100th ton should come along the way, so much the better. Once again I was batting well and should have gone on, but infuriatingly I got myself out to part-time left-arm spinner Michael Clarke for 80 to a ball which pitched around off stump on a fourth-day pitch with a few cracks and, just as I was trying to play forward, kissed the outside edge of my bat and hit Brad Haddin on his thigh before going to Mike Hussey at slip.

It was a soft dismissal. I had actually told myself to wait an over before starting to attack Clarke, who was bowling with a semi-defensive field. A very strong wind was blowing and I wanted to wait for it to die down before I risked stepping out and hitting him over mid off. It was just one of those moments in the game that you are not able to control, moments that make cricket one of the most challenging of all sports.

Despite scoring 73, 32, 41 and 80 in the first four innings in Australia, the talk about me ‘failing’ had resumed and the consensus among the critics was that I was getting out because I was thinking too much about the 100th hundred. Such comments were sometimes hard to take, because for me playing for my country has always come first. The critics were welcome to give their opinions, but none of them had ever been in my predicament and it was impossible for them to understand what I was thinking or feeling.

After Sydney, the series went steadily downhill for us at Perth and Adelaide. We should have played much better and I must say the eight-Test-match losing streak on foreign soil was very difficult to come to terms with. Our team had not lived up to its potential and had been outplayed in all departments. It was a very trying time.

My toe was continuing to pose problems and mentally I was frustrated. It was then that a foot specialist suggested to me that I should have an operation on both my sesamoid bones. In my frustration, I almost agreed and was ready to be on crutches for the next four months, but Anjali dissuaded me from doing so, and in fact spoke to Prof. Cathy Speed in London, who advised that I should avoid surgery. Anjali then came all the way to Australia for just two days to spend some time with me because she was worried that I would go ahead with the surgery out of frustration. I am glad I listened to her and that good sense prevailed.

After the Test series there was widespread speculation that I had made myself available for the subsequent limited-overs tri-series against Sri Lanka and Australia just so that I could score my 100th century. Such statements were frustrating because they were simply untrue. One of the main reasons I played in the series was that MS Dhoni came and said to me, ‘
Aap rukh jao. Aap rahoge to achha hoga. Aap agar sab match na bhi khelte ho phir bhi aap rukh jao
.’ (Please stay. It will be good if you stay. Even if you don’t play all the games, please stay.) Perhaps it’s difficult for some to understand the obsessive urge to do well for India, but this is what has given my sporting life a purpose.

Despite playing well in patches, however, we didn’t make it to the final of the tri-series. There seemed to be a cloud of negativity surrounding the game and fans were starting to lose faith in the team. We needed to get things moving again and the next opportunity to do so was in the Asia Cup in Bangladesh in March 2012.

I scored only six in our first Asia Cup game, a 50-run victory against Sri Lanka in Dhaka on 13 March 2012, and the ‘Sachin fails again’ cry started up immediately. Fortunately I was not particularly aware of it at the time, though, as my family and friends did their best to shield me from what appeared in the press.

Our next match was against Bangladesh on 16 March on a track that was slightly slower than the one used against Sri Lanka. The ball did not always come on to the bat and it was going to be important to pace the innings and set a big score for the hosts to chase down. Virat and I rotated the strike well and the scoring rate hovered just above the five-runs-an-over mark for the most of the innings. We had set ourselves a target of 280–90 and were on course to achieve it.

As I passed 80, the pressure started to build and I began to feel the burden of the hundred again. I did my best to put it out of my mind, but it was a truly difficult and frustrating period. I remember an over against Mashrafe Mortaza during the batting powerplay in which three shots I played should have gone for four. They were stopped by some really good fielding or they went straight to the fielders. On another day, I could have taken 12 from the over. On that day, I got nothing.

I had to counter the building pressure and somehow I played a shot for four when I was on 90 that calmed my nerves a little. Meanwhile Suresh Raina, who had come in to bat after Virat, was finding the boundary consistently, keeping the scoring rate up. I was now on 94 and, with another single in the same over, had come the closest to a hundred for a year.

In the forty-first over I took three more singles and was left needing just two more runs. They were perhaps the two most difficult runs of my career. Despite having scored ninety-nine international hundreds, I had experienced nothing like it. Determination, anxiety, relief – all of these feelings came together. I kept telling myself to stay focused and play each ball on merit. It was time to go back to basics and rely on skills I had practised all my life.

When I got to 99 by driving Shakib-al-Hasan to long off, I told myself that the situation demanded patience and it was no time for heroics. Shakib was getting the ball to spin and so when I faced him next I stepped out just a little to smother the turn. As the ball trundled to square leg, I jogged to my 100th international century.

I instantly felt drained. I removed my helmet and pointed to the flag on the front, indicating that I had done it for India. Then I looked at my bat and asked God why it had taken so long when my commitment had been steadfast throughout. More than anything, I was relieved. As I patted the tricolour on my helmet with my bat, I felt a tremendous sense of satisfaction. It gave me a sense of fulfilment that the first player to achieve the feat of scoring 100 international hundreds was an Indian.

Friends often say to me that my celebrations that day seemed rather muted. I remind them that I had been like that for over two decades. I have always preferred to be restrained, except on a few rare occasions. This is not to say I wasn’t proud. Of course I was. When I first played for India against Pakistan in 1989, I had never imagined I would still be playing for the country in 2012, let alone score 100 centuries.

Unfortunately, we went on to lose the match. Bangladesh played really well to chase down a challenging score of 289, with Tamim Iqbal, Jahurul Islam and Nasir Hossain all making fifties and Shakib-Al-Hasan and Mushfiqur Rahim getting very close. I was amazed to hear some people say we should have got a few more runs to be safe, as 289 wasn’t a bad score on that pitch, considering that we had restricted a much better Sri Lankan batting line-up to 254 in their run chase in the previous match on a better batting pitch. Sometimes you have to give the opposition credit and on this occasion the Bangladeshis played really well.

While we were all disappointed at losing the match, my team-mates were extremely happy for me. It was gratifying to see such powerful emotion within the team. This is what one plays for, the respect and affection of one’s team-mates, and I was touched to hear the sentiments expressed in the dressing room.

After finishing a rather long press conference, it was time to speak to Anjali and the children. They were holidaying in Goa and were having dinner at Martins, one of my favourite seafood restaurants, when I first spoke to them. They were extremely happy and relieved at the same time. My family had also been feeling the effects of the pressure and now they felt a sense of liberation. It was only natural that I should dedicate the hundred to my brother Ajit, who has spent a life making me the cricketer I am. My mother was in our house in Mumbai and was extremely thrilled to watch me score the hundred. I could sense the joy in her voice. Though I was not around to see my mother’s face, I could picture her and imagine what she must be feeling. Sensing her delight gave me a feeling of contentment that is difficult to describe. Suffice to say I was a very proud son.

When I got back to India, I was overwhelmed at the reception and wish to put on record my deepest gratitude to everyone who had prayed for me. The event organized by Mukesh and Nita Ambani, the owners of the Mumbai Indians, was fantastic, and to hear the legendary Lata Mangeshkar sing for me was an unbelievable experience. These are moments I will never forget, moments that more than made up for the year of frustration.

We were still involved in the Asia Cup and were due to play Pakistan in Dhaka a couple of days later. I was suddenly feeling a lot more relaxed and was looking forward to batting in what is always a special game for an Indian cricketer, wherever it’s played.

When I was interviewed by the former Pakistani captain Ramiz Raja, I suggested to him that I was feeling 50 kilos lighter. In reality it was a little more. The desperation had vanished and it was time to enjoy batting again. Life, it seemed, was finally back to normal. A number of journalists asked me what I was thinking after scoring the 100th ton. I jokingly said to them that I was thinking that I had scored ninety-nine centuries before but everyone seemed to have forgotten about them when trying to give me advice about how to bat. Then someone asked me, ‘What were you thinking when you scored your first Test hundred in 1990?’ I said to him that I was thinking that there were ninety-nine still to go!

I felt completely different when I went out to open the batting against Pakistan, trying to chase down a formidable score of 329. We lost Gautam Gambhir in the first over, but Virat and I batted freely and put together a 133-run stand at almost seven runs an over. We set up the chase and when I was out for 52, Virat and Rohit finished off the job in style, with Virat ending up with a brilliant 183.

The innings against Pakistan put into perspective how difficult the wait had been and how much pressure I had been under. Despite trying not to think about the 100th hundred, I hadn’t been able to escape the tension that had built up. Finally I felt liberated and, more importantly, the media’s obsession had been satisfied. Maybe now I would be allowed to concentrate on my batting. For the time being, there was a rare period of calm, and I was desperate to make the most of it.

1st Test. Lord’s. 21–25 July 2011

England 474–8 dec (KP Pietersen 202*, MJ Prior 71, IJL Trott 70; P Kumar 5–106) and 269–6 dec (MJ Prior 103*, SCJ Broad 74; I Sharma 4–59)

India 286 (R Dravid 103, A Mukund 49,
SR Tendulkar 34
; SCJ Broad 4–37, CT Tremlett 3–80) and 261 (SK Raina 78, VVS Laxman 56,
SR Tendulkar 12
; JM Anderson 5–65, SCJ Broad 3–57)

England won by 196 runs

2nd Test. Nottingham. 29 July–1 August 2011

England 221 (SCJ Broad 64; P Kumar 3–45, I Sharma 3–66, S Sreesanth 3–77) and 544 (IR Bell 159, TT Bresnan 90, MJ Prior 73, EJG Morgan 70, KP Pietersen 63; P Kumar 4–124)

India 288 (R Dravid 117, Yuvraj Singh 62, VVS Laxman 54,
SR Tendulkar 16
; SCJ Broad 6–46) and 158 (
SR Tendulkar 56
, H Singh 46; TT Bresnan 5–48, JM Anderson 3–51)

England won by 319 runs

3rd Test. Birmingham. 10–13 August 2011

India 224 (MS Dhoni 77,
SR Tendulkar 1
; SCJ Broad 4–53, TT Bresnan 4–62) and 244 (MS Dhoni 74*,
SR Tendulkar 40
, P Kumar 40; JM Anderson 4–85, SCJ Broad 2–28, GP Swann 2–88)

England 710–7 dec (AN Cook 294, EJG Morgan 104, AJ Strauss 87, KP Pietersen 63, TT Bresnan 53*; A Mishra 3–150, P Kumar 2–98)

England won by an innings and 242 runs

4th Test. The Oval. 18–22 August 2011

England 591–6 dec (IR Bell 235, KP Pietersen 175, RS Bopara 44; S Sreesanth 3–123, SK Raina 2–58)

India 300 (R Dravid 146*, A Mishra 43,
SR Tendulkar 23
; TT Bresnan 3–54, GP Swann 3–102) and 283 (f/o) (
SR Tendulkar 91
, A Mishra 84; GP Swann 6–106, SCJ Broad 2–44)