Surprisingly...have never written about another lingering passion of mine ...cricket; on the blog...ever...
the tipping point though arived today 3:00 pm....
was standing outside 'south indian' as it is called...after a very very heavy curd rice meal ready to drop off on the road itself...thats when it arrived...
"score kya hua hai??" ...
"kucch tha 208 declared....aur haan....kumble's retired by the way...."
"kyya????"
"haan haan....just declared it in the morning...injured bhi to hai...."
and that was that....
not for the first time..was left speechless and shocked in the middle of a road...
drifted back to my first lingering memory of kumble...
think it was the hero cup final against west indies in 1993....
a lanky, bespectacled...rocket scientist lookalike...stormed the windies; who were demolishing teams till then..in the finals...
6/12 his final figures i still remember...amazing,astounding,magical bowling...
as eden gardens erupted in fireworks...india...and lil manoj suddenly had a brand new hero...
was in third standard at that time...remember twirling my arm over for a year after that wanting to be 'kumbleee'....
another match in 1996...against the aussies..before they were 'THE' aussies....India had fallen apart after sachins departure as usual...and a tearful lil manoj was watching crestfallen till kumble and srinath took the likes of fleming and co by the scruff of their necks and actually batted india to an improbable win...
1998..at the kotla...on a dirt bowl of a track...much to a slightly older lil manoj's sadistic pleasure..batsman after batsman had absolutely no answer to jumbo's doosras,teesras and 'etc'ras that were coming at them....remember cursing aloud when the 10th pakistani batsman skied up the ball in somebody elses over fearing that his perfect 10 would not arrive....
thankfully...even the gods didnt want it that way...only the 2nd person ever to take a perfect 10 in the history of cricket...wow....just wow...
was not following a series in the carribean where India were getting slaughtered...a friend in college mentioned one fine day..."kumble's got guts dude...damn..you should have seen him yesterday..." confused...started to the nearest cyber cafe...remember my first reaction on seeing that pic of his bowling replete with strapped jaw..."shit...holy shit" courage thy name is kumble...
and strangely...the most recent memory comes from a quiz question.... "who scored the only century for India in england last season....??" ... before i could get my rusty brain on track... another team burst out on the buzzer excitedly... "Kumble!!!" ...
"whoa?? well....yeah..actually...kumble!! wow!"
Jumbo's cricketing heroics would require a separate blog per se...and these stray reflections are more of my personal memories...in a cricketing world replete with bully's, overtly macho and overtly competitive 'super-stars', holier than thou attitude throwers...Jumbo was always a revelation....fiercely competitive...a tiger on the field...and yet always the perfect gentleman off it...
"he cant spin..." , "no variation" "medium-pacer" "indian pitches only" and many many other things...said the critics...and toady a report card that says 500+test wickets...India's highest wicket taker...and that too by quite a number...
for over a decade when India's bowling languished..Jumbo valiantly toiled for that elusive breakthrough...on flat pancakes of tracks...in killing conditions India's lone bowling hope....jumbo...walked on...without complaining...he spun on...
the old guard is changing....Dada first....now Jumbo...and there are quite a few fledgings right in place...yet....yet....
stray idiots will rejoice that "the oldies gone..he was no good anyways..." cynics will say.. "was a paper tiger...harbhajan has always been better" ..and tearful goodbyes like this one shall also be penned down...
the fledglings shall take over the ball...and the advent of 'captain courageous' dhoni will finally be complete...
and yet...amidst all of this...valiantly...silently...manfully...and as ever..humbly....kumble shall declare his innings over...
a legend walked off a cricket field for the last time today....a legend...
was not shedding tears (that is reserved for the damned day the lil master will decide to hang up his boots), but with an absolutely heavy heart walked off home...
cos a little part of me, a bit of 'lil manoj' had also walked off into the sunset...
3 comments:
like many lil manoj, there were many who were actually big fans of kumble... well, he deserved every bit of it..
i still remember, whenever i came to bowl, i tried to imitate his patent action of tossing the ball in the air, just before he bowled..
that hero cup was really special, semi-final mein sachin's magical last over and kumble's astounding spell in the finals (i cant remember any other spinner to knock out a batsman with a yorker)...
even i was shocked when i turned on the news in the evening and saw kumble has declared his retirement... i got a tear in my eye.. i told my mom-- 'kumble now, dada in next test' shitt... i am sure when i will see dada saluting out of the ground at the end of the next match, (dont think he will be carried on shoulders though), i will surely burst out cryin..
absolutely dude...
the end of an era beckons for people like us who have grown up over greats like jumbo,dada, the wall and of course...
the lil master...
we're getting old :)...a sign of the times...
and ya...the hero cup semi final...fabulous fabulous over..thanks for reminding me!
ps: would love to see you toss up that way when you come on to bowl... promise to clout you allover the park
;) hee ha ha
Kumble is one of the Three Gods of Spin..
Dada is the King of Straight Sixers.
Waaaaahhhhh :(
The pic of the jaw-broken Kumble has always been a symbol of dedication to so many ppl out there.. And will always remain so..
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