A Thorn Called Sanga

Gary Kirsten became India’s cricket coach two years ago. On Saturday he said he now enjoys some Hindi film songs. Kirsten did not specify which ones—“you are putting me under pressure,” he said—but it is not unlikely that he likes to hum, maybe, ‘Kajra Re’.

It is India’s success on the cricket field, however, that is real music to Kirsten’s iPod. The victory over Sri Lanka in the Mumbai Test is taking some time, thanks to captain Kumar Sangakkara’s fighting, unbeaten 133 on Saturday. But Lanka have only four wickets left and are and still 59 runs in arrears; it will almost certainly happen on Sunday. That will make India the No.1 Test team in the world.

“It is something that we aspired to 18 months ago before we started against Australia,” Kirsten said. “It will be a great achievement. Hopefully, we can wrap it up tomorrow. The credit goes to the players. They have stood up to the tests. We have a powerful top 7 in the batting line-up. The bowlers have done their job.”

After the heroics of Virender Sehwag, which powered India to their highest total ever (726/9 declared), the bowlers were back at work on Saturday. Harbhajan Singh bowled 31 overs, much less than the 50-plus that Muralitharan and Herath sent down for Sri Lanka but enough for the umpires to become experts on his floppy hat. By the time play concluded, his clothes were covered in the hallowed dust of the Brabourne. Everything is hallowed here. Even the food. You eat hallowed samosas and then take hallowed digestives.

Left-arm spinner Pragyan Ojha bowled 23. But while he skillfully took two wickets (Angelo Mathews and Prasanna Jayawardene), he and Harbhajan could have done better. Thankfully the seamers contributed. Some of Sreesanth’s away-going deliveries were a treat to watch, pitching right and moving just enough to beat the batsman. The discipline he lacks in his conduct seems to somehow manifest in his bowling; he stays close to the stumps even while walking back past the umpire to his bowling mark.

I love watching caught-behind dismissals and will remember for long the Zaheer Khan ball that snared Mahela Jayawardene. There are great deliveries that turn a lot, like Shane Warne’s Ball of the Century, and there are great deliveries that move just enough. Zaheer’s was like that. I was in one of the members’ enclosures at the time. Even a wrinkled old lady in a blue pant suit got up to train her trembling hands, which held dainty red binoculars, at the on-field celebration.

Mathews was the fifth wicket to fall. With almost 30 overs still to go, India seemed on course to finish it off today. But the 64-run stand for the sixth between Sangakkara and Prasanna Jayawardene made a fifth day mandatory.

“The second session was a big one for us, we were able to pick up four wickets,” Kirsten said. “I thought we kept it tight in the first session, and did not give away unnecessary runs. The third session wasn’t good enough. The guys were a little tired.”

The man won’t have happy memories of Brabourne is Tillakaratne Dilshan. Like in the first innings, he got an outrageous decision in the second too. In the first, a ball that looped off his pads was ruled as a catch. In the second, he was adjudged leg before when he wasn’t.

Asked how Dilshan had reacted in the dressing room, Stuart Law, Sri Lanka’s assistant coach, said, “I wouldn’t want to repeat it. He was disappointed and sat with his pads on for a long time.”

Law also pointed out that had Dilshan not got a bad decision in the first, he might have batted longer and that could have altered, if only slightly, the course of the match. “But that is hindsight,” he said. “If I lived my life with the benefit of hindsight, I would be a genius.”

Gary Kirsten became India’s cricket coach two years ago. On Saturday he said he now enjoys some Hindi film songs. Kirsten did not specify which ones—“you are putting me under pressure,” he said—but it is not unlikely that he likes to hum, maybe, ‘Kajra Re’.

It is India’s success on the cricket field, however, that is real music to Kirsten’s iPod. The victory over Sri Lanka in the Mumbai Test is taking some time, thanks to captain Kumar Sangakkara’s fighting, unbeaten 133 on Saturday. But Lanka have only four wickets left and are and still 59 runs in arrears; it will almost certainly happen on Sunday. That will make India the No.1 Test team in the world.

“It is something that we aspired to 18 months ago before we started against Australia,” Kirsten said. “It will be a great achievement. Hopefully, we can wrap it up tomorrow. The credit goes to the players. They have stood up to the tests. We have a powerful top 7 in the batting line-up. The bowlers have done their job.”

After the heroics of Virender Sehwag, which powered India to their highest total ever (726/9 declared), the bowlers were back at work on Saturday. Harbhajan Singh bowled 31 overs, much less than the 50-plus that Muralitharan and Herath sent down for Sri Lanka but enough for the umpires to become experts on his floppy hat. By the time play concluded, his clothes were covered in the hallowed dust of the Brabourne. Everything is hallowed here. Even the food. You eat hallowed samosas and then take hallowed digestives.

Left-arm spinner Pragyan Ojha bowled 23. But while he skillfully took two wickets (Angelo Mathews and Prasanna Jayawardene), he and Harbhajan could have done better. Thankfully the seamers contributed. Some of Sreesanth’s away-going deliveries were a treat to watch, pitching right and moving just enough to beat the batsman. The discipline he lacks in his conduct seems to somehow manifest in his bowling; he stays close to the stumps even while walking back past the umpire to his bowling mark.

I love watching caught-behind dismissals and will remember for long the Zaheer Khan ball that snared Mahela Jayawardene. There are great deliveries that turn a lot, like Shane Warne’s Ball of the Century, and there are great deliveries that move just enough. Zaheer’s was like that. I was in one of the members’ enclosures at the time. Even a wrinkled old lady in a blue pant suit got up to train her trembling hands, which held dainty red binoculars, at the on-field celebration.

Mathews was the fifth wicket to fall. With almost 30 overs still to go, India seemed on course to finish it off today. But the 64-run stand for the sixth between Sangakkara and Prasanna Jayawardene made a fifth day mandatory.

“The second session was a big one for us, we were able to pick up four wickets,” Kirsten said. “I thought we kept it tight in the first session, and did not give away unnecessary runs. The third session wasn’t good enough. The guys were a little tired.”

The man won’t have happy memories of Brabourne is Tillakaratne Dilshan. Like in the first innings, he got an outrageous decision in the second too. In the first, a ball that looped off his pads was ruled as a catch. In the second, he was adjudged leg before when he wasn’t.

Asked how Dilshan had reacted in the dressing room, Stuart Law, Sri Lanka’s assistant coach, said, “I wouldn’t want to repeat it. He was disappointed and sat with his pads on for a long time.”

Law also pointed out that had Dilshan not got a bad decision in the first, he might have batted longer and that could have altered, if only slightly, the course of the match. “But that is hindsight,” he said. “If I lived my life with the benefit of hindsight, I would be a genius.”

Gary Kirsten became India’s cricket coach two years ago. On Saturday he said he now enjoys some Hindi film songs. Kirsten did not specify which ones—“you are putting me under pressure,” he said—but it is not unlikely that he likes to hum, maybe, ‘Kajra Re’.

It is India’s success on the cricket field, however, that is real music to Kirsten’s iPod. The victory over Sri Lanka in the Mumbai Test is taking some time, thanks to captain Kumar Sangakkara’s fighting, unbeaten 133 on Saturday. But Lanka have only four wickets left and are and still 59 runs in arrears; it will almost certainly happen on Sunday. That will make India the No.1 Test team in the world.

“It is something that we aspired to 18 months ago before we started against Australia,” Kirsten said. “It will be a great achievement. Hopefully, we can wrap it up tomorrow. The credit goes to the players. They have stood up to the tests. We have a powerful top 7 in the batting line-up. The bowlers have done their job.”

After the heroics of Virender Sehwag, which powered India to their highest total ever (726/9 declared), the bowlers were back at work on Saturday. Harbhajan Singh bowled 31 overs, much less than the 50-plus that Muralitharan and Herath sent down for Sri Lanka but enough for the umpires to become experts on his floppy hat. By the time play concluded, his clothes were covered in the hallowed dust of the Brabourne. Everything is hallowed here. Even the food. You eat hallowed samosas and then take hallowed digestives.

Left-arm spinner Pragyan Ojha bowled 23. But while he skillfully took two wickets (Angelo Mathews and Prasanna Jayawardene), he and Harbhajan could have done better. Thankfully the seamers contributed. Some of Sreesanth’s away-going deliveries were a treat to watch, pitching right and moving just enough to beat the batsman. The discipline he lacks in his conduct seems to somehow manifest in his bowling; he stays close to the stumps even while walking back past the umpire to his bowling mark.

I love watching caught-behind dismissals and will remember for long the Zaheer Khan ball that snared Mahela Jayawardene. There are great deliveries that turn a lot, like Shane Warne’s Ball of the Century, and there are great deliveries that move just enough. Zaheer’s was like that. I was in one of the members’ enclosures at the time. Even a wrinkled old lady in a blue pant suit got up to train her trembling hands, which held dainty red binoculars, at the on-field celebration.

Mathews was the fifth wicket to fall. With almost 30 overs still to go, India seemed on course to finish it off today. But the 64-run stand for the sixth between Sangakkara and Prasanna Jayawardene made a fifth day mandatory.

“The second session was a big one for us, we were able to pick up four wickets,” Kirsten said. “I thought we kept it tight in the first session, and did not give away unnecessary runs. The third session wasn’t good enough. The guys were a little tired.”

The man won’t have happy memories of Brabourne is Tillakaratne Dilshan. Like in the first innings, he got an outrageous decision in the second too. In the first, a ball that looped off his pads was ruled as a catch. In the second, he was adjudged leg before when he wasn’t.

Asked how Dilshan had reacted in the dressing room, Stuart Law, Sri Lanka’s assistant coach, said, “I wouldn’t want to repeat it. He was disappointed and sat with his pads on for a long time.”

Law also pointed out that had Dilshan not got a bad decision in the first, he might have batted longer and that could have altered, if only slightly, the course of the match. “But that is hindsight,” he said. “If I lived my life with the benefit of hindsight, I would be a genius.”

Gary Kirsten became India’s cricket coach two years ago. On Saturday he said he now enjoys some Hindi film songs. Kirsten did not specify which ones—“you are putting me under pressure,” he said—but it is not unlikely that he likes to hum, maybe, ‘Kajra Re’.

It is India’s success on the cricket field, however, that is real music to Kirsten’s iPod. The victory over Sri Lanka in the Mumbai Test is taking some time, thanks to captain Kumar Sangakkara’s fighting, unbeaten 133 on Saturday. But Lanka have only four wickets left and are and still 59 runs in arrears; it will almost certainly happen on Sunday. That will make India the No.1 Test team in the world.

“It is something that we aspired to 18 months ago before we started against Australia,” Kirsten said. “It will be a great achievement. Hopefully, we can wrap it up tomorrow. The credit goes to the players. They have stood up to the tests. We have a powerful top 7 in the batting line-up. The bowlers have done their job.”

After the heroics of Virender Sehwag, which powered India to their highest total ever (726/9 declared), the bowlers were back at work on Saturday. Harbhajan Singh bowled 31 overs, much less than the 50-plus that Muralitharan and Herath sent down for Sri Lanka but enough for the umpires to become experts on his floppy hat. By the time play concluded, his clothes were covered in the hallowed dust of the Brabourne. Everything is hallowed here. Even the food. You eat hallowed samosas and then take hallowed digestives.

Left-arm spinner Pragyan Ojha bowled 23. But while he skillfully took two wickets (Angelo Mathews and Prasanna Jayawardene), he and Harbhajan could have done better. Thankfully the seamers contributed. Some of Sreesanth’s away-going deliveries were a treat to watch, pitching right and moving just enough to beat the batsman. The discipline he lacks in his conduct seems to somehow manifest in his bowling; he stays close to the stumps even while walking back past the umpire to his bowling mark.

I love watching caught-behind dismissals and will remember for long the Zaheer Khan ball that snared Mahela Jayawardene. There are great deliveries that turn a lot, like Shane Warne’s Ball of the Century, and there are great deliveries that move just enough. Zaheer’s was like that. I was in one of the members’ enclosures at the time. Even a wrinkled old lady in a blue pant suit got up to train her trembling hands, which held dainty red binoculars, at the on-field celebration.

Mathews was the fifth wicket to fall. With almost 30 overs still to go, India seemed on course to finish it off today. But the 64-run stand for the sixth between Sangakkara and Prasanna Jayawardene made a fifth day mandatory.

“The second session was a big one for us, we were able to pick up four wickets,” Kirsten said. “I thought we kept it tight in the first session, and did not give away unnecessary runs. The third session wasn’t good enough. The guys were a little tired.”

The man won’t have happy memories of Brabourne is Tillakaratne Dilshan. Like in the first innings, he got an outrageous decision in the second too. In the first, a ball that looped off his pads was ruled as a catch. In the second, he was adjudged leg before when he wasn’t.

Asked how Dilshan had reacted in the dressing room, Stuart Law, Sri Lanka’s assistant coach, said, “I wouldn’t want to repeat it. He was disappointed and sat with his pads on for a long time.”

Law also pointed out that had Dilshan not got a bad decision in the first, he might have batted longer and that could have altered, if only slightly, the course of the match. “But that is hindsight,” he said. “If I lived my life with the benefit of hindsight, I would be a genius.”

About The Author

Akshay Sawai