Prince of Kolkata bids adieu to Cricket

Zeenews Bureau Nagpur, Nov 10: A glorious career comes to an end on Monday… Sourav Ganguly, a man with a never-say-die spirit, will be seen on the field wearing the Indian cap for the last time today. Known as the best ever captain to have represented India, the Royal Bengal Tiger will bid his adieu to cricket today and will be remembered as a man who had a career as dramatic as it can be.The Prince of Kolkata went out for a duck in the last innings of his career’s final Test match at Nagpur against Australia, thanks to Jason Krejza’s spin spell. Sourav Ganguly has had a career of that of a hero. The day when Dada announced his retirement to the world, it seemed to be the end of an era for many. He made his debut in the year of 1989, but subsequently dropped from the side because he allegedly refused to carry drinks to the ground. And for most of the people it seemed end of his career. In 1996, the tour of England marked his comeback to international, the reason being him being in ‘good-terms’ with Jagmohan Dalmiya. Most of the people thought Sourav did not deserve to be in the side. But in his very first match of the tour he proved everyone wrong by scoring a century and Lords witnessed birth of another Indian batting icon… An excellent player of spin, Sourav tried to play a sweep shot off Brad Hogg, on his Test debut, and was caught at slip. But what followed was a success story for every one to remember. Ganguly made his mark on both ODIs and Test matches but as his career progressed he became a better player of ODIs than Tests. Along came the Sahara Cup 1997, the second bilateral series between India and Pakistan in Toronto, Canada. Ganguly who was known for his batting only, not only scored runs in that series but also picked up 16 wickets and became Man of the Series taking everyone by surprise. As they say no one is perfect in this world and Ganguly was no exception. Though Ganguly was called the God on the off side of the wickets the short pitched balls proved to be a bane for him. I still remember how Aquib Javed and other Pakistani bowlers took advantage of it in three ODIs series in Pakistan. Soon every side stated to target short pitched stuff and one could not foresee Sourav’s success story to continue for long as far as international matches were concerned. But we were yet to witness what metal this man was made of. With balls above the shoulder not considered as legitimate deliveries in ODIs then Ganguly made heaps of runs in ODIs and with Sachin battling with back injury post 1998 and Rahul Dravid still finding his foothold in the international arena Ganguly soon became the mainstay of Indian batting line up. Dada’s fortune in ODIs actually changed in Titan Cup 1996 when he was asked to open with Sachin Tendulkar against South Africa and though India ended up being on the losing side in that match however the match saw probably the best ODI opening pair batting for the first time. Sourav-Sachin proved nightmare for almost every team in the world cricket succeeding like no other pair. One just can’t forget their 252 run opening stand against Sri Lanka when both of them scored centuries and then got out of consecutive deliveries showing how inseparable they are. Sourav then played his first cricket World Cup in England in the year 1999. Though, India could not go past the super-six stage in the tournament more because of India’s loss to Zimbabwe in the league stage the tournament was remembered by Indian cricket fans for Dravid’s batting, who became the highest run getter in the tournament and his partnership of 318 runs with Sourav Ganguly against Sri Lanka. The match saw both the batsmen taking Sri Lankan bowling apart and Sourav went on to score his highest in the ODIs 183 not out. It was the highest individual score of an Indian in the tournament surpassing Kapil Dev’s 175 not out against Zimbabwe in 1983 World Cup. The 183 by Ganguly still remains highest individual score by any Indian in the world cup.