Some hot, others not

The World Cup has witnessed 253 matches from 1975 to 2003. Of these, some went right down to the wire, while others were hopelessly one-sided. Devendra Prabhudesai profiles five ‘cliffhangers’ and five ‘anti-climaxes’ that fall somewhere in between

HUMDINGER

West Indies v Pakistan, 1975

Pakistan batted first and scored a competitive 266-7. The West Indies needed a good start, but did not get it with Sarfraz Nawaz making the ball talk. Wickets fell at regular intervals; too many of them for West Indies’ liking. Sixty-four were needed from 14 overs when the ninth wicket fell, and Andy Roberts came in to join Deryck Murray. Majid Khan, who was leading Pakistan in the game in the absence of the injured incumbent Asif Iqbal, gambled on finishing it off by bowling out Sarfraz. The gamble failed. Murray and Roberts did not forget the fact that they had plenty of deliveries left, and placed the ball into the gaps to take their side home in the final over. Pakistan, who had lost their earlier round-robin game to Australia, found themselves out of the tournament with two losses out of two, while the Windies qualified for the semi-finals. The game marked the ODI debut of a cricketer who went on to become the first cricketer to appear in six World Cups: Javed Miandad.

Result: West Indies won by one wicket

Australia v India, Chennai, 1987

Opener Geoffrey Marsh scored 126 as the non-fancied Australians amassed 270-6 against the hosts and holders in what was the first game of the tournament for both sides. India got off to a rollicking start, with Gavaskar and Srikkanth toying with the Australian bowling. The attack was sustained by ODI debutant Navjot Sidhu, who hit five sixes in an individual score of 73. At 207-2 in 37 overs, the Indians were cruising to a comfortable win, only to be undone by their traditional tendency to panic at the wrong time. An incisive spell by Craig McDermott in the final stages only added to their woes. Although the runs kept coming, the wickets tumbled, and the hosts found themselves needing six to win in the final over with their last pair at the crease. Maninder Singh managed two twos off Steve Waugh, but his nerves got the better of him. He went for a big hit to finish the game, when a tip-and-run approach could have served the purpose. He missed, and was bowled. 

Result: Australia won by one run

Australia v India, 1992, Brisbane

The ridiculous rain-rule, that favoured and plagued almost every participating side, hit the Indians hard in this game. Fifteen minutes of the Indian innings were lost to rain after Australia scored 237-9. That prompted the umpires to deduct three overs from the innings and invoke the rain-rule, which strangely penalised a fielding side for bowling well! Accordingly, the three ‘lowest-scoring’ overs bowled by the Indians earlier in the game were disregarded, and India’s target revised to 236 from 47 overs. The beleaguered side went for it after a slow beginning. Skipper Mohammed Azharuddin blasted a scintillating 93 and Sanjay Manjrekar scored 47 off 42 balls. But there was little or no support, and they began the final over needing 13. Kiran More swept the first two balls for fours, but was bowled off the third. Only one run came off the next two balls, and Javagal Srinath was faced with the task of getting a boundary off the last ball. He and his non-striker Venkatapathy Raju managed two before the latter was run out.

Result: Australia won by one run

WI v Pakistan, Karachi, 1987

Pakistan took 12 years to settle scores with the West Indians. To say that the round-robin encounter between the two star-studded sides lived up to expectations would be an understatement. The Windies scored 216, and their bowlers then made life miserable for the Pakistani batters. Imran Khan and Salim Yousuf rallied their side, but both batsmen fell at the wrong time. Fourteen were needed from the last six balls with the last pair in the middle. Abdul Qadir and No.11 Salim Jaffer brought the equation down to ten off three. The best leg-spinner of the 1980s then went for broke. He hit Courtney Walsh, one of the tightest of bowlers, for a six and two twos to take his team to an improbable win. But it may not have come down to the final ball; Walsh had the opportunity to run Jaffer, the non-striker, out, for backing up too far. But the Jamaican opted to follow the spirit of the sport. He issued a warning, only for Qadir and an entire nation to say ‘thanks’.

Result: Pakistan won by one wicket

Australia v WI, Mohali, SF, 1996

Richie Richardson and his men could not have asked for a better start. When the fourth Australian wicket fell with only 15 on the board, the West Indian management may well have initiated inquiries about the flights to Lahore, where the final was to be played three days later. But trust the Australians to find a way out of the hole. Stuart Law and Michael Bevan steered the side to a ‘respectable’ 207-8. They needed early wickets, but the West Indian batsmen were in no mood to be generous. At 165-2, with 43 needed from 54 balls, the West Indies had one foot in the plane to Lahore. But they succumbed to the old human failing of thinking about the celebrations before completing the job. When Chanderpaul fell for a priceless 80, they sent in pinch-hitters Roger Harper and Otis Gibson ahead of specialist batsmen Jimmy Adams and Keith Arthurton. Two individuals named Glenn McGrath and Shane Warne respectively, spotted an opening and sought to exploit it. The result - a sensational collapse in which eight wickets fell for 37 runs.

Result: Australia won by five runs

ANTI-CLIMAX

India v Pakistan, Sydney, 1992

The first-ever face-off in World Cup history between the Asian powerhouses was widely anticipated. India batted first and scored 216-7 from 49 overs, and Kapil Dev and Manoj Prabhakar snared two early wickets. At 16-2, Pakistan were up against it, but the euphoria of the Indians evaporated when they saw Javed Miandad, their old nemesis, make his way to the middle. The maestro got the innings going in the company of Aamir Sohail with percentage cricket. Troubled by inflammation in his stomach and a painful left (front) foot, Miandad relied on back-foot cuts, deflections and glides, his experience, and of course, his hold on the Indian psyche, a direct consequence of the unforgettable last-ball six at Sharjah in 1986. His ability to keep cool in crises was, however, tested by Indian wicketkeeper Kiran More. A barrage of verbal volleys culminated with Miandad impersonating the keeper’s appealing style. But More and his teammates had the last laugh. Sohail’s dismissal at 105 sparked off a collapse. A tussle that had all the makings of a thriller ended on a tame note.

Result: India won by 43 runs

West Indies v Australia, Oval, 1975

It was the biggest Group B clash in the inaugural tournament. Both sides, although not very experienced in terms of one-day cricket, played a brand of cricket that fitted the shorter version of the sport to perfection. But the proceedings on the field were as one-sided as they could get. Clive Lloyd asked Australia to bat when he won the toss, and his bowlers got into a rhythm straightaway. The frontline bowlers did the bulk of the damage, and part-timer Viv Richards applied salt on Australian wounds by bagging two wickets. Australia were bowled out for a measly 193, and it was up to the likes of Lillee and Thomson to do what their Caribbean counterparts had done earlier in the day. But the West Indies batsmen, the diminutive Alvin Kallicharran in particular, were in a destructive mood. Dennis Lillee of all bowlers bore the brunt of Kallicharran’s belligerence; the left-hander spanked him for 4,4,4,4,4,1,6,0 and 4 off consecutive deliveries, and the West Indies won with 14 overs to spare.

Result: West Indies won by seven wickets

Pakistan v Australia, final, 1999

The 1999 final was played in the shadow of the greatest-ever World Cup game - the ‘tied’ semi-final between Australia and South Africa. The spectators and television viewers were delighted at the prospect of watching two thrillers in quick succession. But the Australians, who had qualified for the final courtesy their Super Six win over South Africa, did not have the slightest inclination to feature in another cliffhanger. After Wasim Akram had won the toss and opted to bat, Steve Waugh and his men set out to not just dominate, but demolish. They bowled and caught spectacularly to dismiss the Pakistanis for 132. Shane Warne, who had turned the semi-final on its head, once again played the lead role, with 4-33 from his ten overs. The Australian festivities commenced as soon as Adam Gilchrist and Mark Waugh began their reply. The match ended in the 21st over when Darren Lehmann cut Saqlain Mushtaq for four.

Result: Australia won by eight wickets

India v Sri Lanka, SF, 1996

The match began and ended with bedlam. The Indian cricket team and hundred thousand spectators at Kolkata’s Eden Gardens were ecstatic when Jayasuriya and Kaluwitharana returned to the pavilion in the very first over, with only one run on the board. But Aravinda De Silva essayed a classic. His heroic 66 enabled his team regain the initiative, and they scored 251-8, a handy total to achieve on a wicket that was steadily getting slower and lower. For the Indians, Sidhu fell early, but Tendulkar and Manjrekar looked relatively untroubled. The score was 98-1 when a brilliant piece of cricket by keeper Kaluwitharana brought about the little champion’s dismissal. It proved to be the ‘turning’ point for the Sri Lankans. The spinners proceeded to bamboozle the subsequent Indian batsmen on a pitch deteriorated in double quick time. India were a disastrous 120-8 when the spectators subjected the playing arena to a fusillade of bottles and other rubbish. Clive Lloyd, the referee, awarded the match to Sri Lanka, even as Vinod Kambli wept like a baby. 

Result: Sri Lanka won by default

Australia v India, final, 2003

Australia had won each of their ten encounters prior to the final, while their opponents had won nine. Australia, in fact, were the only side to have beaten Sourav Ganguly’s men. The final was preceded by a series of speculations, wherein the ‘law of averages’ was mentioned and discussed, albeit not debated. Australia, it was reasoned, were bound to fall prey to the ‘law’ at some stage. The Indians had decided to bat first on a flat Wanderers pitch, but one look at the damp spots on the track convinced the think-tank that bowling first might well be a good idea. After all, Srinath, Zaheer Khan and Ashish Nehra had as much to do with the team’s presence in the final as Tendulkar, Sehwag, Dravid, Yuvraj, Kaif and Ganguly. Zaheer bowled the first over and sledged the Australian openers like there was no tomorrow. The only problem was that he conceded as many as 15 runs while doing the same. India needed 360 from 50 overs, and although Sehwag did his best, they folded up for 234.

Result: Australia won by 125 runs

Devendra Prabhudesai has authored the recently released ‘Around the world in seventy-and-a-half days’, a book that profiles the seventy most memorable World Cup matches