By now, the complaints made against television commentators are familiar and fall into well-established categories: they are dismal peddlers of cliché and unexamined prejudice; they traffic in superfluity; they dispense reams of pedantry. But mainly, they talk and babble a great deal, and in doing so, they often obscure the action taking place on the pitch, in front of our eyes.

To be sure, sometimes commentators dispense wisdom, especially when supplemented by the wizardry of the super slow-mo. But this is rare, and does not make up for the other aural tortures inflicted on us viewers. No Sir, the signal to noise ratio is appalling when it comes to the television commentator. A good television commentator, like Flannery O' Connors' "good man", is hard to find.

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The story of Azeem Hafeez

The unremarkable Pakistan left-arm quick with an unusual handicap

Samir Chopra

25-Feb-2013

Sometime ago I had posted a piece on Duleep Mendis and Roy Dias on the Different Strokes blog, motivated by a desire to shine a spotlight on memorable feats in cricket, which I felt hadn't received their due. I hope to keep doing that here at the Pitch, and in a similar vein, I want to talk a bit about cricketers who had only walk-on parts on the world's cricketing stages, but for some reason or the other, managed to make themselves memorable to me.

My first entry in what will, hopefully, be a long roll of honour, is the Pakistani left-arm quick Azeem Hafeez. His Test statistics are unremarkable: he played 18 matches between 1983 and 1985 and took 63 wickets at an average of 34.98 and a strike rate of 69. Azeem perhaps played only because the great Imran Khan was on the mend; he left because another great, Wasim Akram, had given notice of his potential, and more importantly, was Imran's new blue-eyed boy.

Why then, do I remember Hafeez? What makes him so enduring in my cricketing imagination? For two reasons, neither of them particularly earth-shatteringly interesting or important, but for a teenage cricket fan they added up. For one thing, he was replacing Imran in a series against India, and my curiosity was piqued: who was it, precisely, that was supposed to fill the great man's shoes in this clash of arch-rivals?

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Satellite television and the neutral cricket encounter

Living in the US has always meant looking homeward for cricket

Samir Chopra

25-Feb-2013

Living in the US has always meant looking homeward for cricket. Thanks to a steady improvement in my cricket watching lot here due to broadband streaming, matters are not quite as desperate as they used to be till a few years ago, when every trip to India was to be evaluated on the basis of just how much live cricket it had afforded. Every time I return to India to find a true cornucopia of cricket on multiple channels (some now in 'High Definition'), I am reminded again, of just what a long way we've come, baby. And nothing quite marks that journey like the presence of the 'neutral' cricketing encounter on Indian television sets.

In 1993, soon after journeying to India for an extended vacation, I found, while perusing the newspaper with my morning cuppa, a listing that scarcely seemed credible: a live telecast of a Pakistan-West Indies encounter. I stared at the unambiguous lettering with some disbelief.

A few days later, I was watching Wasim Akram and Waqar Younis bowling live to Desmond Haynes and Brian Lara at Port of Spain in the first Test of the 1993 series. To say that this was a cricketing feast would be a severe understatement. For as long as I had lived in India, the live telecast from overseas had been a rare treat. The India-Pakistan 1978 series had been the first one in my living memory. After that, it had been the semi-finals and finals of the 1983 World Cup, the one-day internationals from Sharjah, Australia and England during 1985-86.

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Oh no, not again: the great misses continue

In 1978, seven years after the Bangladesh War, India and Pakistan resumed cricketing ties in a three-Test series played in Pakistan

Samir Chopra

25-Feb-2013

In 1978, seven years after the Bangladesh War, India and Pakistan resumed cricketing ties in a three-Test series played in Pakistan. After playing out a draw in the first Test at Faisalabad, drearily in conformance with the cricketing history of the two sides, Pakistan beat India in the Lahore Test, thanks to Zaheer Abbas' magnificent 235, and a very enterprising run-chase on the fifth day in which Pakistan scored their runs at 6.19 an over, and galloped home with 8.2 overs still left in the day. This was heartening enough for fans of Test cricket, but it was the third Test that really showcased positive Test cricket at its best.

Sitting on a 1-0 lead against their archrivals, in a series fraught with emotional and political significance, Pakistan chased down a victory target of 164 runs in a maximum of 100 minutes. At times, the asking-rate had mounted to seven an over. No matter; the Pakistan batsmen, especially Asif Iqbal and Javed Miandad scrambled singles like a pair of amphetamine-crazed ravers, drove the Indian fielders batty, and then finally, thanks to Imran Khan's assault on Bishen Bedi's bowling late in the game, Pakistan scampered home with an over to spare.

That was 33 years ago. Well before Twenty20 cricket had been conceptualised, and only three years after one-day cricket had staged its first World Cup. Just like India going into the Dominica Test that concluded on Sunday, Pakistan enjoyed a 1-0 lead in 1978. They could very well have shut up shop, strolled over to the victory dais, picked up their thousand-rupee cheque (I'm guessing that's what the prize money must have been in those days), and posed for the post-series victory shots. Mushtaq Mohammad could have given us some pablum about not being disappointed, about how Sunil Gavaskar had held them up on the final day, how the Karachi pitch was a bit slow and not conducive to penetrative bowling and so on.

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Stepping away from the keyboard: Talking about cricket

I am a net cricket fan; that is, almost all the cricket I consume and discuss is internet-centered

Samir Chopra

25-Feb-2013

I am a net cricket fan; that is, almost all the cricket I consume and discuss is internet-centered. I watch cricket on the 'net, I talk about it on the 'net. Thus, most of my 'talking' about cricket is reading and writing about it (I am excluding the half-duplex communication with television commentators). This has also meant, willy-nilly, that I have developed a style of thinking about it that is peculiar and distinct, reliant upon only partly self-conscious attempts to persuade or be persuaded by the written word.

This mode of thinking about cricket is so much a part of my makeup as a fan that I do not pay explicit attention to it. But I am reminded of its existence and its disjuncture from other ways of relating to cricket whenever I am forced to talk about cricket: when I, that is, meet another fan in the flesh and cricket, magically, enters the conversation. Perhaps I travel (earlier this month, I spent three weeks in India); perhaps other fans come traveling (this week, a good Australian friend is in town for a conference); however it works out, fans meet, pleasantries are exchanged and talk turns to the game.

At that point, I notice that my very own cricketing opinions sound strange to me; their aural form is not what I'm used to; I'm used to writing down thoughts about cricket, organising them a little, perhaps, hopefully, making them more coherent. But in their spoken form, they acquire a texture, perhaps a depth or superficiality that I might not have known they possessed. And sometimes it forces me to revise them, quickly, sometimes right there and then, and sometimes in the future, when, you guessed it, I get back to discussing cricket by writing about it.

But it is not just I that sound different; other fans sound different too. The rhetorical force of the spoken word sometimes surprises me: by far the most effective polemic I have heard made against the DRS came from my brother, who during a conversation over drinks during my trip to India, expressed himself pungently, sharply and succinctly with the spoken word and added a marvelously evocative, contemptuous, and dismissive shake of the head. I felt myself persuaded; I felt compelled to adopt a point of view I had only dimly perceived as worthy of my support.

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Tape-delayed cricket in 2011

This year, thanks to the vagaries of television rights allocations, US residents are back to the good old days of the tape-delayed broadcast

Samir Chopra

25-Feb-2013

This year, thanks to the vagaries of television rights allocations, US residents, if inclined to follow the IPL, and to retain some suspense for themselves, are back to the good old days of the tape-delayed broadcast. It might be 2011, but it feels delightfully old-fashioned. The challenges of not being exposed to the scores are harder but a fan can always find his way around them.

Dealing with tape-delay broadcasts is not just a matter of television of course. Indians old enough to have followed radio broadcasts of Test cricket from the West Indies will remember that the post-tea session, which would have been broadcast from (I think) 2-4 AM, was instead taped and then played back from 5-7 AM. I would, after listening to the pre-tea sessions, sleep with a transistor next to my pillow, and on waking up, tune in again.

The illusion was perfect; how could it not be? There was no way to find out the scores and the only intervening experience had been that of sleep. It was thus that I heard the commentary for what I still consider one of the most exciting Test finishes of all (albeit at India's expense): West Indies' chase of 172 runs in 25 overs in the 1983 Kingston Test. I awoke on the chilly morning of 28th February 1983, just in time to catch Roberts' demolition of the Indian tail, as India subsided from 168 for 6 to 174 out. Suddenly, West Indies were in with a chance, even though they'd have to score at close to seven runs an over. But then Viv Richards played, what was by his own judgment, his best innings ever, to score 61 off 36 deliveries; Gus Logie hit a six off the first ball he faced in the second innings; Mohinder Amarnath lost the plot. When the match ended, I hooped and hollered; it was a great finish; I wanted a result; it didn't matter that India had lost to the mighty West Indies. Losing to West Indies, wasn't such a disgrace, really.

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Deserting a dream

Samir Chopra

25-Feb-2013

On March 11, 2011, during the World Cup qualifying round, as Bangladesh stumbled to 169-8 chasing England's 227, several spectators at the Zahur Ahmed Chowdhury Stadium in Chittagong started heading for the exits. I was watching the game on my desktop machine in my living room; I was accompanied by an American colleague and friend that had stopped by, on my invite, to try and catch a bit of World Cup excitement. He seemed perplexed by their exit, and honestly, so was I. Bangladesh needed 58 runs to win in a little over 10 overs with two wickets in hand. It was unlikely, sure, but it was a World Cup game, only 10 overs were left. Sure, your team had come an absolute cropper in the last game, but surely, it was worth it to hang around and see if they could pull it off, given that they were this close?

Right. Well, we know how that turned out. And those folks in Chittagong that did leave must have wanted, if only they had the ability of professional contortionists, to be able to deliver a swift, painful kick on their own backsides. For nothing is quite as painful as deserting a game, whose eventual resolution is one you craved. You desert a dream in the process. (On these very pages, I have written about my painful decision to abandon India's run chase against Australia at Mohali last year).

The Bangladeshi rush for the exits reminded me of an abandonment with a twist. During the epic Kirti Azad game at Delhi's Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium in September 1983, I sat in the stands, shell shocked and dismayed at India's collapse to 101-8, chasing 197. Victory seemed unlikely, and to make things worse, it would happen at home against Pakistan. Sitting next to me were a young man and his father. Soon after the eighth wicket fell, the father began pestering his son. It was time to go; the traffic would be bad later; these losers deserved no more of their time. The young man stoutly resisted for a while. But, eventually, an over or so later, he agreed to leave. Father and son departed.

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Once we were kings

It's not everyday a grown man can say, "Today, I'm going to cry"

Samir Chopra

25-Feb-2013

It's not everyday a grown man can say, "Today, I'm going to cry". And yet, that prediction was one I could make with some confidence on Tuesday, April 26, as I headed into Manhattan to catch the North American premiere (at the Tribeca Film Festival) of Fire in Babylon, Stevan Riley's documentary tribute to the champion West Indies teams of the 1970s and 1980s. I wasn't wrong: I blinked, I swallowed hard; I felt a lump in my throat, and for many, many moments, was transported again to a time when the lithe body language of the West Indian cricketer was the final signature flourish on a display of cricketing skill unlikely to ever be seen again.

For cricket fans who came of age in the 1970s, those two words, "West Indies", still convey something of the aura of that most incredible of cricketing outfits, whose combination of power, panache and physicality ensures they will remain the benchmark setters for a long time yet. The rampant Australians of the late 1990s and early 2000s set new statistical benchmarks and enthralled us with their skills as well. But, they didn't have the on-field charisma of West Indies.

Can any modern cricket image match that of the West Indian slip cordon settling down, their hands plucking at their trousers to raise them ever so slightly as the quick sprinted in? Can any modern team match the the swagger, the bravado, of Lloyd's crew? The baggygreen wearing Aussies come the closest, and yet, they will themselves acknowledge, they had some way to go.

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India's Great Misses, Part Three

Samir Chopra

25-Feb-2013

The first two misses in this series of great misses - India's failure to pull off a run-chase at the Oval in 1979, and to bowl out the Aussie tail and then mount a small fourth-innings chase at the MCG in 1985 - were falls at the last hurdle. But for the third entry in this series, there is no one such moment of failure (as there wasn't in the recently concluded India-South Africa third Test). Instead, a series of small fatal errors added up, ultimately corroding India's push for a win, which would have ranked, in terms of historical significance, right up there with India's 1979 Oval Test. I feel the failure in this Test all the more keenly because along with the Bridgetown Test of 1997, it is the Test that I witnessed the greatest proportion of in the flesh: I spent four out of its five days at the SCG.

Welcome then to the SCG in January 2004. India had already pulled off a great miss in the MCG Test, where they had subsided from 278 for 1 to 366 all out, and the later, in the second innings, when, chasing a lead of 192, they had moved 61 runs ahead, with six wickets in hand, on their way to setting Australia either an awkward target or saving the game, they suddenly subsided to 286 all out.

Thus India had failed to protect their 1-0 lead by the time they got to Sydney. When they left Sydney, they had failed to pull off an epic win, one which would have done for Sachin Tendulkar what the Oval Test could have done for Sunil Gavaskar. They failed to dramatically end the Waugh era with a dethroning that would have ensured a dramatic crowning for the Indians. They had failed to pull off a series win against an Australian team reckoned the greatest in the modern era. (Yes, McGrath and Warne weren't playing; the perfect time to pull off an ambush was at hand!)

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India's Great Misses: Exhibit Two - The 1985 Boxing Day Test

India have never beaten Australia in Australia

Samir Chopra

25-Feb-2013

India have never beaten Australia in Australia. They've won Tests but have never managed to win a series. This history is made possible by two spectacular instances of snatching draws from the jaws of victory. Nothing showcases this better than the Boxing Day Test of the 1985-86 series, the fifth day of which shall forever live in infamy. The post-traumatic stress induced by this Test match still gives me the midnight chills.

A brief introduction to Exhibit Numero Dos in my rogues gallery of Great Indian Misses. It was the second Test of the three-Test series, to be followed by the endlessly prolonged shenanigans of the triangular world cricket series (featuring New Zealand as well). The first Test in Adelaide, which featured a carrying-the-bat epic by Sunil Gavaskar, had ended in a draw. When the second Test began, India immediately seized the advantage by reducing Australia to 210-8 on the first day. When the second day's play ended, India looked set for a sizeable lead, thanks to their 187-3, a patient response to Australia's eventual 262 all out. The next day, things got better, even if a little slowly, as India moved to 431-9 (my memory fails me as I do not remember whether rain cost any playing time on the first four days). The Indian middle order of Amarnath, Vengsarkar, Azhar, and Shastri all crawled a bit, but still by close of the third day, a 169-run lead was on the board.

The next day, India were bowled out for 445, giving them a lead of 183. By close of play, they had reduced Australia to 228-8. Allan Border was on 98 not out, playing a familiar role. Incredibly, Australia were only 45 runs ahead with two wickets in hand as the fifth day's play began.

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