HAD IT BEEN 20

“When you win you needn’t to explain when you lose you should not there be to explain.” 
-Hitler

Many things in life start getting importance, if not importance then at least an unforgettable story, for which you never thought much off. College cricket is the one of those for me.

13^th March 2013
Semifinals of the cricket league (spanned over two semesters, for first time it was). This prolonged spanning resulted in few changes in the format of the tournament as well as many changes in the form of players in there. Talking of my own form at first I was a bit slow on footwork maybe because of the chilling winter but as the winters faded they improved. Apart from those, a good knock in the city just before the semis lifted the confidence and it was brimming up and up. 

In the practice, was feeling comfortable against all balls except a few which drifted towards leg. We had sessions of practice not with our own team but with the players of opposition too. Well speaking of opposition, I just wanted to say that this semi was a final before final.

Everything was well set, was determined to win and had the potential too. And suddenly comes the twist, at the very beginning, that due to some unprecedented reasons the 20-20 format has been curtailed to 16-16 (big hand of cricket politics I must confess). It shook me at first, at that time only I felt the plot was lost. Braced myself up and the team and thought that okay! No problem it’s going to be the same for both the team, though it wasn’t. I mean how come we can have tournaments where league matches and knock outs have different span. To be very frank this was my 21^st tournament of life and 3^rd of this college but never saw such things.

Let’s see how it proceeded.

Now being an active member of the club, I was having the role of doing markings and linings of the ground with some other members. Just a day before our semifinal, another decider was to be played so we had to the marking a day before. Under the scorching sun with handkerchiefs around the mouth with dark spots of sweat on it, we were on our job. I was thinking of something in mind and soon it happened when it came to lining of pitch with the remark “take 19(in metres)” instead of 20.5 metres. After few instances of argument, even I thought let them be happy and how much it will affect and settled in for 19.5 metres.

The D-day arrived, as usual my team captain kept waiting the opponent for the toss. He has got some serious traits of Nadal and Ganguly in doing that. Don’t know whether it’s a trick to play with the patience of the opponent when stakes were so high or just a habit. To be honest I as a captain never did so and has been rewarded for those punctuality by winning every toss! (Well I am exaggerating here, I have lost a few but those can be counted). As I said captains are rewarded for their punctuality and hence the opponent won the toss and elected to bat first. I was happy at that time because I love to chase irrespective of the pitch conditions. And this pitch of our college has hardly favoured batting second (another one).

It was time to make team hurdle, to discuss and few words of motivation. Well for me it was simple don’t make them play those 16 because from my past experience I always believed that our opponents were an excellent bowling side but not that good at batting, if you make them struggle a bit they will struggle hard at large. I was confident that our bowlers will do it, but as I have already mentioned that things were at high stake and these situation makes you nervous, though I wasn’t so (don’t know why, usually a bit of it helps you). A sudden change of body language did happen one of the bowler remarked “we don’t have to take wickets just get the dot balls.” On hearing that in my mind I was like what the f**k, cmon!!offence is the best defence and that too against a medium ranged batting side you are bound to attack and attack hard they don’t even get time to realise what happened but it was all nervousness that was taking the game away from of us. Innings started and opponent were going at a descent pace, but as already mentioned that they were not a strong batting side as their bowling was and hence chances erupted at the early stages and later too, but it was series of blunders that left us with nothing more than regretting. After a mixed game of play largely dominated by our opposition they posted a mammoth target of 150 in 16 for us. What was interesting to know is that my analysis about our opposition proved very accurate they were 8 down and around 3 to 4 easy chances were dropped. And most of the cricketers out there can understand what dropping chances at any stage of match do to the course of match. In the given scenario I projected of 80-90 all out.

It was innings break, I was preparing my mind with some unwanted fuzz going around (there I felt that we need a dressing room very badly or atleast some segregation from spectators). I just said to the two openers “just attack” I will manage at back, giving them confidence to hit hard. This time they didn’t disappointed me and it was attack from the very first ball, with six we started. They continued the momentum and you can get the idea of how strong we were against such an excellent bowling attack- the best of our college. We hurried into 60s in just 6 overs bowled without any loss of wicket and any shot played in fuss. Everyone was excited and the worst part was even I was. 

With around the score of 90s by the end of 11^th over we were cruising and then first wicket fall. I know it slowed a bit but..what could have been done. After the fall it was my time to go out there and live up to the expectations. I always loved to play in these situation where you need to hit at least two on every ball. During my game stay in Delhi, I used to do this job more often from opening till the end. But in college team most of the time I played a role where I take time to settle and then get the run over the par rate. I was excited and this anti nature played the trick. Off the very first ball I was thinking of hitting boundaries, and the situation demanded it too. Coincidence was that I was facing the bowler which I have practiced the most in the nets during this semester (Frankly speaking this I came to know after the match, at that time I was so much concentrated on ‘hitting’ thing that I didn’t even realised who the bowler was!). Coming out of the crease I tried to cut a good length delivery, nicked it and got out. It was all blank and black. And soon we lost it. Surrounded by pain and a numb feeling. I looked up in sky, smiled and said “Once again” and left for post match proceedings.

19^th March 2013

Tomorrow morning I have my minor exams. It’s been exactly a week after. I don’t want to give explanation to anyone for what happened a week before. But people out there demand, and I rarely respond to those but a remark from the guard of our college “Mein aaya tha wahan par dekhne ke liye, lekin aap to pehle hi ball pe out ho ke chale gaye” followed by a moment of complete silence with a smiling face made me realise if not to everyone but atleast to myself I need to. It was that 20 which actually made the difference if I look into way behind the actual stage where it all happened. I won’t say result would have been different, but I have learnt, things which you consider insignificant turns out to be more significant many a times.

By looking up in the sky it was not God for me, it was life’s vastness; which made me realise that never leave the feet off the ground, every time I will do it, I will be pulled back to struggle and achieve once again from a new beginning.