INDIA CRICKET’S PORT OF PAIN

For the “true” cricket loving Indian fan, the “Garden of Eden” and the “Oval Park of the Queen” ARE 2 happy hunting grounds and hugely historical ones at that. ARE??? Nay, I should change it to HAD BEEN. After the ignominious defeat to the hand of tigers of Bangladesh and the subsequent ouster from cricket’s mega event, the Queen’s Park Oval, Port of Spain, Trinidad would always be remembered as the venue where “Cricket India” hit its proverbial nadir.

And the plot was not supposed to peter out this way. Let’s take a sneak peek at history. India’s first success against an almighty Caribbean team led by the legendary Sir Garfield Sobers happened way back in 1971 at this particular venue. The decisive win there gave India her first Test series triumph against the West Indies.

For the uninitiated, India has won just four test matches on West Indies soil and all of them, save one, has come at Queen's Park Oval. After the historic 1971 win, there have been wins in April 1976, when she chased down 406 in the last innings - the second highest successful fourth innings chase in test cricket ever and finally the one in April 2002.

The QPO was the venue where the greatest Indian batsman of all time IMHO, the little master Sunil Manohar Gavaskar, made an electric debut scoring 132 of his 10,122 Test match runs in two match winning knocks. SMG has also scored most runs by an Indian in one Test Match 344 (124 & 220) again at the same venue. Most interestingly, he teamed up with brother-in-law Vishwanath, each scoring dazzling centuries, in the historic chase down of the final innings 406 in 1976 again at PoS, the first time the cricketing Everest of the “4th inning 400” was reached.

Therefore, the fall from grace from such dizzy heights, will always look gargantuan especially, when India were being touted, albeit meretriciously, as possible world cup champions. A sizable presence of PIO (people of Indian origin) living in Trinidad & Tobago has always ensured good support for India’s cricketers, who have also found the pitches at this venue thankfully responding to spin bowling. Add to that people who flew in to the Windies from every conceivable part of the world to cheer for the Men in Blue. With all the tradition, support, pitch quality, a supposed “world beating” batting line up and “world class” coaching and support staff, it was but a huge shock (Indian cricket no longer gives surprises) that the bridesmaid of the last edition could not even graduate to the next round of the “2007 Copa Mundial”. Whether, they can rise from these ashes like the proverbial phoenix, is what a secular country of billion and more, which so theatrically calls cricket its only religion will expectantly wait and watch. Till then let us all look back and ponder at the catastrophe that befell Indian cricket at what has turned out be Indian cricket’s PORT OF PAIN.