The Jewel In The Crown

Rahul Dravid's innings at Kolkata on March 16, 2005 was quite magnificent. India at the time of writing find themselves in a critical situation and may well go on to lose this match, so maybe this particular 100 will not find a place in the league of the 233, 148, 180, 270 etc. But in terms of sheer quality of strokeplay this was an innings of the highest class. After the great man's phenomenal exploits in Australia 2003 and Pakistan 2004, he seemed just a shade off-colour at the start of the season although he still scored pretty heavily. But the home series against Australia and South Africa saw an inexplicably tentative, uncertain Dravid. Today however, he was his usual crisp, clean and correct self.

The first indication came with his very first boundary off Abdul Razzaq, an delectable cover drive of a delivery only fractionally overpitched. Like hundreds of times earlier, the left foot came forward, knee bent and bat stroked the ball to the boundary with such immaculate precision that one could find poetry in prose. If that shot was pure class, the boundary of Danesh Kaneria's last over before lunch was something more - it was a statement of intent. Kaneria had more or less kept all Indian batsmen (except perhaps Sehwag) honest so far and was largely responsible for initiating the Mohali fightback which was a 2-step process of strangulation and escape. That shot clearly sent the signal that India were determined to attack Kaneria (attack - a word that had suddenly vanished from the team's dictionary for a period of 5 days) besides being executed to perfection.

And just in case there were still doubts, Afridi's first ball after lunch was disposed to the extra cover fence. And then (I admit I have only read about this) his 100 was brought up by 2 consecutive fours - one a typical cover drive; the second a flick just wide of mid-on. The second shot was significant - generations of Indian batsmen would have played it squarer and flashier to the mid-wicket. Not Dravid. The perfectionist that he is (and sometimes he gets lashed for that) he played it the text-book way, less flashy yet such a joy to behold. As I had said earlier, Dravid's batting is like Mathematics - precise, yet beautiful.

Lot of praise for Dravid in the last couple of days in the blogosphere - here and here and on Wisden Cricinfo here. Osman Samiuddin while lamenting lack of batting resources of Pakistan envies and applauds those of India - while going on to add that the single most important of these is Rahul Dravid - The Jewel In The Crown