Desert Storm: The Innings That Defined A Generation

The 90s was a time where the game of cricket was starting to evolve and move into the modern age. This period saw the innovation of tactics, such as former New Zealand captain Martin Crowe using the off-spinner Dipak Patel with the new ball in the 1992 World Cup and having Mark Greatbatch open the batting as a pinch-hitting option, or Sri Lanka captain Arjuna Ranatunga pushing Sanath Jayasuriya and ‘keeper Romesh Kaluwitharana as openers and basically asking them to go hell-for-leather in the first 15 overs, something which got them to win the 1996 World Cup as the absolute underdogs. Even in Indian cricket, a churn was happening during this time, where ageing stars like Kris Srikkanth, Ravi Shastri, Kapil Dev started to retire, a new crop of players emerged led by Sourav Ganguly, Rahul Dravid, VVS Laxman, Ajay Jadeja, Anil Kumble, Javagal Srinath and the likes. But one player who started his international career as a baby-faced 16-year-old in 1989 at Pakistan, of all places, was the leader of this pack and became the poster-boy of an entire generation of cricket fans in India and shores abroad, and on 22^nd April 1998, he played possibly the innings that became the calling card for our generation.

Sachin Tendulkar came into the year 1998 on the back of what could be considered as his annus horribilis in his cricketing career that was about to hit 10 years. His captaincy was under the scanner right through the year of 1997, with a crushing series defeat in West Indies with the 81 all-out in the 4^th innings at the Barbados Test, where India was chasing only 120 to win the test, marking the nadir of his captaincy. In ODIs, he was approaching the year with 33 innings having gone by without a century. At the start of the year, he lost his captaincy as well, which of course didn’t make it a great start to the year for him. But somewhere, the loss of captaincy flicked on an invisible switch in Sachin and he suddenly was finding himself in the runs again. His performance in the Independence Cup in Bangladesh was important in India’s eventual victory, which was followed by his demolition job of his arch-rival Shane Warne and Co. along with Navjot Singh Sidhu, Rahul Dravid, Mohammed Azharuddin and Sourav Ganguly in the Border-Gavaskar Trophy test series at home against Australia, which India won with a 2-1 margin. But his best was about to come in Sharjah.

India made a stop at Sharjah to play the Coca Cola Cup Tri-Series against Australia and New Zealand in April ’98 and India’s performances in the first three games were not exactly up to grade, with a close win against New Zealand being followed by defeats against Australia and New Zealand in the reverse fixture, which made their game against Australia a virtual knockout match, as India could only qualify for the finals if they beat Australia outright or leapfrog New Zealand on Net Run Rate to face Australia once again in the final to be played a couple of days later. Sachin had been in decent touch through the 3 games, with a score of 80 against Australia in the previous fixture being his best score. Australia won the toss and batted first and riding on an unbeaten century from Michael Bevan and an 81 from Mark Waugh, went on to score 284/7 in their allocated 50 overs.

India opened with the Ganguly-Tendulkar opening partnership, which was slowly establishing themselves as a quality opening pair, but were rocked early when Ganguly’s scratchy innings of 17 from 32 deliveries was cut short by an LBW shout from Damien Fleming. ‘Keeper-batsman Nayan Mongia was promoted at first drop to join Sachin, who was looking in imperious touch, having smashed a couple of sixes off pacer Michael Kasprowicz’s over deep midwicket and deep square-leg. The pair quickly started moving the scoreboard along, with Sachin playing some delectable back-foot punches along the ground for boundaries and hitting Shane Warne for fun through and over the infield. With Mongia too was playing a few good looking strokes and motoring along quickly, Sachin soon got to a half-century, but Mongia perished for a good-looking 35 off 46 balls off Tom Moody and then captain Mohammad Azharuddin and Ajay Jadeja followed Mongia into the pavilion, leaving Sachin and newcomer VVS Laxman to rescue an innings floundering at 138/4 after 29 overs.

When the score was reading 143/4 after 31 overs, a sandstorm started blowing which engulfed the stadium, which stopped play and forced the players off for around 20 minutes. Sachin at that time was batting on 64 and looked impatient to get back into the thick of the action. When the umpires saw fit to recall the players back into the game, the equation was revised to India chasing a target of 276 runs in 46 overs, and they now had only 15 overs to score the remaining 133 runs, but if India could get to 237, they could leapfrog New Zealand and make it to the final on the basis of a superior Net Run Rate. While our modern-day standards of T20 cricket may have made this equation look relatively comfortable, in ’98, an equation like this existed only in the realms of impossibility and improbability. But, with Sachin still around and possessing a murderous intent, no equation could’ve stood before his talent. On air, Ravi Shastri had said about him “He is a champion and he needs a challenge”, so Sachin had now set himself a challenge to take the team into the final singlehandedly. His intent was made especially clear after the resumption of play, when he blasted Kasprowicz over his head for a gigantic six off the final delivery of the 32^nd over. After this, genius stroke melded away into another genius stroke, as Sachin slapped, slashed, hammered and cracked each Australian bowler out of sight, prompting the legendary Tony Grieg to roar into the microphone “They’re dancing in the aisles of Sharjah” after yet another Sachin boundary which he lapped through the fine-leg/deep square-leg boundary. When Sachin got to his hundred, it marked a sign of a man who was batting with the intention of not merely being content to just achieve the qualification score to make it to the final, but instead, go for the victory and send a cold, hard, uncomplicated message to the opposition, which prompted Tony Grieg to once again say “Sachin Tendulkar wants to win this match”, after crashing yet another six down the ground off Damien Fleming.

At a personal score of 143, facing his 131^st delivery in this knock and India placed at 244/4 after 42.5 overs, comfortably into the finals, Sachin was dismissed caught-behind off Fleming off a slightly dodgy decision, but walked off, having comfortably put himself amongst the Pantheon of legendary cricketers and the knock, is regarded, till date, as one of the greatest ever knocks in the entire history of ODI cricket, and also, in the words of India’s present-captain and chaser-extraordinaire Virat Kohli, it was this Sachin hundred that influenced him the most to become the master run-chaser that he has now become.

The Desert Storm innings is an innings that has defined my generation of cricket fans, and not only cricket fans, it also defined the changing resolve of India as a country that can no longer be tagged as an underdog. There’s just one thing that can define Sachin and this knock and it comes, once again from Tony Grieg, who has now immortalised this knock. “What a player, what a wonderful player!”