File Pic: Image from the historic India vs Australia Test in 2001 at Eden Gardens. Twenty-five years ago this week, few were giving Indian cricket hope. Bruised, tarnished by a match-fixing scandal barely a year ago and struggling to save face, a rudderless team hosted here Steve Waugh‘Invincibles’. What unfolded would change Indian cricket forever. TOI goes back to the watershed moment…Her eyes sparkled as she ran down the stairs when she stopped suddenly. The downstairs lobby of Eden Gardens was teeming with journalists, officials and hangers-on when the Indian cricket captain, just a year into the job, emerged from the dressing room, opened the glass door and waded into the pool in a delirium. Sourav Ganguly, who had not yet changed out of his whites, looked up, gave Mrs. Ganguly a beaming smile and said quite loudly, “After the press conference…”
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Go Beyond The Boundary with our YouTube channel. SIGN UP NOW!But his fluid gaze conveyed a deep-seated yet exuberant joy that could never be lost in translation—not even after 25 long years. “Yes, we did it, love,” he said simply.Memories bring diamonds and rust and that 30-second vignette and what came before at Eden Gardens remains the shining light of Indian cricket long after the dust settled long after Steve Waugh’s ‘Invincibles’ returned from the final boundary.It was the summer of 2001. Indian cricket was gasping for fresh air to remove the stench of match-fixing scandals that refused to leave the white flannel. The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) has slapped former captain Mohammed Azharuddin with a life ban and Ajay Jadeja with a five-year ban. Sachin Tendulkar ditched the captaincy, leaving behind a dangerous void that required immediate attention. In such adverse circumstances, Ganguly was entrusted with steering the ship without a rudder, a decision that was to pay dividends manifold. The team came through with a 3-2 one-day win over South Africa and after 15 consecutive Test victories, Steve Waugh’s Australia reached the three-Test series. Comparisons with Donald Bradman’s 1948 Invincibles were part of the dinner table conversations and the Australians were on Waugh’s trail in Mumbai. The Australians completed the first Test match in three days and lived up to the reputation that preceded them as their tally reached 16.Calcutta, renamed just two months ago, was their next stop. Captain Waugh scored a century – his only in India – and his bowlers, including the irrepressible Glenn McGrath and Shane Warne, exposed India’s usual flaws and reduced them to a tough, long chase in the match.A small blip or bump in the road rattled the Australians in the first innings. The nimble young off-spinner, who grew up to become Bhajji, trapped Ricky Ponting and Adam Gilchrist off two successive balls before scalping Shane Warne with the third to become the first ever Indian to take a hat-trick in Test cricket. The youthful impudence of Harbhjahan Singh (7/123) was somewhat unscripted and allowed the packed crowd to dance at the prospect of the fight.Visitors could not read the writing on the wall. So were the scribes in the press box, who were mostly convinced of an Australian victory.Ganguly’s team did not want to hide without striking. Waugh pushed for the follow-on after India went down in the first innings and regretted his decision long after the last ball was bowled by none other than Harbhajan as the shadows on the Eden pitch continued to lengthen for three days. VVS Laxman scored a struggling half-century amid a crumbling Indian batting edifice in the first innings to earn promotion to bat at No.3 as Waugh forced follow-on.During the fourth day, Laxman and Rahul Dravid batted and sculpted a sports sculpture that can be paralleled with Michelangelo’s David if you’re an art buff. If political history is your calling, you might think of Stalingrad.The match turned on its head. The magnitude of the fall can be understood by the fact that it was the Australian wicketkeeper, Adam Gilchrist, who tasted defeat for the first time in Test cricket since his debut in November 1999, 15 Tests ago.The match turned and so did the fortunes of Indian cricket led by the redoubtable Ganguly who kept the visiting captain waiting on the field before the toss just to make a point. Taking the fight to the opposition, psychologically and tactically, was his brainchild, something unheard of in the annals of Indian cricket.Asked about the impact of the reversal, the Australian captain said: “The sun will come out tomorrow.” Ganguly’s India really shined.The third Test in Chennai was another street battle and young Harbhajan finished with 32 wickets to help India wrap up the Test series against the high and mighty. Although the impact of the series victory was not immediately felt.The Eden Test was the inflection point where Ganguly’s team turned the corner. From an unwashed, smelly trail to a tree-lined sports-sized avenue.After 25 years, the Eden Test match remains a hanging conversation without superficial sighs.Ahead of the second Test at the Eden Gardens in Kolkata in March 2001 in Australia, Mumbai extended their winning streak to sixteen, the best by any team in Tests, with their ten-wicket triumph in the first Test at the Wankhede Stadium. They took a 1-0 lead in the series.
