It was a miserable Sunday for Indian sport if you were watching cricket. India were outplayed in every department and roundly beaten by arch rivals Pakistan who won their first Champions Trophy title. If however you were not watching the finals of the Champions Trophy 2017 and were watching hockey or badminton instead, you would have been far happier. We look at yesterday's cricket high low lights before touching on things that delight and not cause despair.
Opting to field first was seen as Virat Kohli's first blunder of course (in hind sight everyone becomes a cricket expert). The ineffectuality of Indian bowlers and the doughty Pak opening partnership of 128 runs; managing a runout at a belated stage was the sign of things to come.
His century was a class act. His 114 off 106 was the backbone of the Pak innings. Opener Azhar Ali (59 off 71), Babar Azam (46 off 52), Mohammad Hafeez (57 off just 37) were other contributors to the intimidating total of 338/4.
The otherwise effective Indian bowling attack seemed toothless yesterday and the Indian batting looked positively ragged right from the beginning. Wickets fell with depressing regularity – when the scorecard read 0, at 6, 33, 54, again at 54 and 72 and so on.
While other Indian batsmen seemed to succumb without any kind of fight, Kunal Pandya gave the Indian innings a semblance of respectability. His 50 came in record time and 76 made him the highest run getter of the Indian team.
India were all out at 158; a humiliating 180 run loss for those considered favourites to win the tournament. For Pak cricket, this is a much needed shot in the arm. In the cricketing wilderness for close to the decade, this was the first major tournament they have won in ages.
In our cricket obsessed nation, few people were watching hockey, but they should have been! It was a thumping victory for the men in blue; India defeated Pakistan by a whopping 7-1 margin in the Hockey World League Semi-Final 2017.
He may have missed his chance at a medal in the Rio Olympics but at the Indonesian Open Premier Super Series he was invincible. He beat Kazumasa Sakai of Japan 21-10, 21-19 to clinch the title. It is heartening that he took just 36 minutes to crush his foe. It is also heartening that there is a well established system in place in Indian badminton; that the system is managing to consistently produce champions.
It is telling that while you could stream and watch Kidambi Srikanth’s amazing feat online, no major sports channel was airing it live.
Hockey may be our national sport, but cricket remains our national obsession. Some of us switched to watching hockey, because when we lose at cricket; it hurts… really badly.
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