When England landed at the Wankhede for the semi-final in 1987, puffed-up Indian fans held up placards demanding ‘Quit India’. Others held placards with plans for the next flight to Heathrow.
The trust was not without foundation. Four years ago, the same fans watched India do the unthinkable and made at least one very prominent Englishman eat his words. Literally.
Before the 1983 FIFA World Cup, David Frith, the famous editor of Wisden Cricket Monthly, surveyed the field and dismissed India as hopeless. Frith went further and wrote that if India won the World Cup, he would eat his words.
A few days later, in Manchester, when Sandeep Patil dispatched Bob Willis for a four, scoring 51 in a knock of 160, England were eliminated. The stage was set for Frith to ram his words down his throat.
So when the crowd at the Wankhede in November 1987 waved “Quit India” placards, they did it like world champions. History was on their side. The script has already been written once. It would definitely be written again.
It won’t. This time India would eat her words.
Spirit of 1987
24 hours before the Wankhede match, the mood across the subcontinent was intoxicating. It brimmed with confidence and something close to inevitability.
India went through the tournament losing only one inconsequential group match. The crowds believed, the bookies believed, even the pigeons in the Wankhede Pavilion seemed to believe.
The dream that pulsed through every Indian household was the ultimate victory, the India vs Pakistan final at the Eden Gardens in Kolkata in front of a hundred thousand roaring souls. The mother of all cricket matches.
Pakistani fans were no less confident. Imran Khan led his side to five consecutive victories, and the Lahore crowd arrived at the Gaddafi Stadium with placards reading “WE WILL MISS IMRAN”, confident that he would walk off into the Lahore sunset as a World Cup finalist. Taking it a step further, their girls danced to RD Burman’s irresistible Aa Dekhe Zara and challenged anyone, everyone, the world, “Come on, let’s see what you’ve got.”
Australia had other ideas.
Craig McDermott created the magic of the tournament. Five wickets for 44 runs, dismantling Pakistan’s middle and lower order just as Imran and Miandad threatened to drag their side home. Australia won by 18 runs. India-Pakistan final was dead.
The girls put down Aa Dekhe Zara. Imran’s farewell posters were folded up and forgotten.
None of that mattered the next morning in Mumbai. India were convinced that the cup was staying at home and England, as everyone knew, was already booked on the next flight to Heathrow.
Poisoned food
The night before the match, vice-captain Dilip Vengsarkar, the world’s number one batsman and a man in the shape of his life, went out for dinner with his wife. He reportedly ordered the ribs.
At 2:30 in the morning he was seriously ill. He threw up, weak, body in full revolt. He suffered a severe reaction to a suspected seafood allergy and by dawn it was clear he would not be making the field at Wankhede.
In his place, India turned to Chandrakant Pandit, a backup wicketkeeper who plays in his hometown of Mumbai. A good person. Makeshift dough. But not Vengsarkar. Not even close.
The Indian batting order, which was already carrying the weight of a billion expectations, quietly lost its backbone overnight. Over a plate of ribs.
The signs were ominous. Cricket, as it often does when arrogance is in the air, was already whispering to those willing to listen. No one in the Wankhede was listening. They were too busy waving those banners.
Wounds of the Sweep
Kapil Dev won the toss and gave England. It was a clarion call from the slow Wankhede turner. Two top-class left-arm spinners were waiting in the wings and the sixty thousand crowd was already on its feet. Everything was set.
Then Graham Gooch came out, put on his sun hat, twitched that proverbial mustache and started sweeping.
Two days of quiet, careful preparation in the nets began to pay off when Mike Gatting joined Gooch. Gooch swept Maninder mercilessly – in front of square, behind square, at every angle. Maninder used variations in flight. Shastri bowled flatter. It made no difference. The runs kept coming. Every time Kapil moved the fielder to break the sweep, Gooch found a different angle. The partnership added 117 in 19 overs.
When Gooch was finally caught at deep square leg by Maninder for 115 off 136 balls, the damage was done. England finished at 254 for 6.
Fall of the Legends
India’s response started in the worst possible way. Hometown hero Sunil Gavaskar, playing what everyone knew would be his last World Cup innings, was bowled by DeFreitas for 4. The crowd fell silent.
K Srikkanth followed; Navjot Sidhu was next. Chandu Pandit, Vengsarkar’s unfortunate replacement, came and went for 27, India reeling at 4 for 121. The chase was already on life support.
Then Azharuddin arrived and briefly made the crowd believe again. He cut, drove, flicked his wrist with that relaxed, almost careless elegance that was uniquely his.
At 5 for 168, with six wickets down and the crowd daring to dream again, Kapil Dev lifted Hemmings to deep mid-wicket and was gone. Thirty runs, one ill-advised shot and the last real backbone of the innings returned to the pavilion.
Azharuddin continued to fight alone. He made 64 at 6 for 204. When Hemmings had him, what followed was no chase. It was a funeral procession.
Over, 7 for 205. Prabhakar, 8 for 218. Then Chetan Sharma swung and Lamb ran and dived at deep mid-wicket to take a brilliant catch, 9 for 219. And finally Shastri, the last man, miscued at square leg where Downton ran in to complete the over. The last five fell for 15. India were bowled out for 219, 35 runs short, and sixty thousand people sat in silence, staring at a scoreboard they refused to believe.
The country mourns
All over India that evening there was complete silence. In the living rooms, families sat motionless in front of their Doordarshans, unable to process what they had just witnessed. The streets that had been buzzing with anticipation all morning were suddenly empty.
The dream final between India and Pakistan, the one that billions of people on both sides of the border had written in silence for weeks, never happened. Instead, Australia played England at the Eden Gardens in a non-subcontinental final. The hosts were kicked out of their own celebration.
The banners were quietly folded. Heathrow timetables were quietly pocketed. Somewhere in Mumbai, Dilip Vengsarkar was lying in bed wondering what it could have been. Gavaskar never played for India again. Kapil Dev was never a captain. The semi-final lived like a quietly treated wound, a reminder that even world champions can suffocate in their own confidence.
And that was for a very long time.
Long wait
In the thirty-seven years since that November afternoon, India and England have never faced each other in an ODI World Cup knockout match. Not once. It’s as if the very device that produced one masterpiece of heartbreak has decided it has nothing left to prove.
The ground where India were humbled as the defending champions seemed to cast a long, dark shadow over everything that followed. During the 1990s and into the 2000s, India reached every World Cup with a weight of 1987.
India would wait. It took until 2007, a full two decades, for India to regain the World Cup title. And even then MS Dhoni’s men did it in the inaugural T20 World Cup in South Africa, not in the fifty-fifty format where injuries were inflicted.
Redemption after the fifty came in 2011. When MS Dhoni’s six sailed into the night at the Wankhede and India finally lifted the World Cup again at this very venue, the roar felt like more than celebration. It sounded like 1987 had been laid to rest.
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– The end
Issued by:
Amar Panicker
Published on:
05 March 2026 11:54 IST
