Bloodbath at Sabina Park
Partab Ramchand - 30 April 2002
It was a pity that the 1976 series between India and the West
Indies in the Caribbean ended on a bitterly acrimonious note, for
there was much good cricket in the three Tests prior to the final
game that caused all the controversy and heartburn. Indeed, that
final Test at Kingston has come to occupy a niche in cricket
history but for all the wrong reasons.
Lloyd, by then, had unleashed a bumper and beamer
barrage, with Holding and Daniel freely indulging in short-
pitched intimidatory bowling that went unchecked by the umpires.
The result was that Gaekwad, Viswanath and Patel suffered
injuries, and they had to be taken to hospital.
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The excellent cricket of the first three Tests was in fact a tribute to
the staying power of the players, since both teams must have been
tired even as the series started. The West Indies had just
finished an arduous tour of Australia, and losing the six-match
contest 5-1 could not have done much for their morale. The
Indians, for their part, flew into the West Indies directly from
New Zealand, where they had, rather disappointingly, shared the
three-match rubber 1-1.
And yet, putting aside their mental and physical exhaustion,
India and the West Indies indulged in a cut-and-thrust contest so
that, at the end of three Tests, the result sheet read: West
Indies 1, India 1, drawn 1. There could not have been a better
scenario going into the decider, but what transpired at Sabina
Park was not exactly cricket.
As the series started, most would have tagged the West Indies as
favourites. The rebuilding process under Garry Sobers and Rohan
Kanhai was over, and under Clive Lloyd, the nucleus of a
formidable side was emerging. They had supreme stroke-players
supreme like Vivian Richards - then in the midst of the greatest
phase of his career during which he set the record of 1710 runs
in a calendar year - Laurence Rowe, Roy Fredericks and Alvin
Kallicharran, besides Lloyd himself. In Andy Roberts and Michael
Holding, they had a fearsome pace duo.
To combat this, India had Sunil Gavaskar, Mohinder Amarnath,
Gundappa Viswanath, Brijesh Patel, Surinder Amarnath and Anshuman
Gaekwad to shoulder the batting, while the bowling would revolve
around the spin quartet, then at their peak. Of course, with some
luck Mohinder Amarnath and Madan Lal could be expected to make
the initial breakthroughs to take some burden off the spinners’
shoulders.
Yet, when the West Indies won the first Test by an innings and 97
runs in three days at their favourite venue, Bridgetown, the
stage seemed set for a one-sided result. Within a fortnight,
however, a transformed Indian side had the West Indies by the
scruff of their neck in the second Test at Port of Spain - only
to let them wriggle out through dropped catches.
But then the Indians had a stroke of good fortune. The third Test
was scheduled to be played at Georgetown, but due to incessant
rain at Guyana, the match was shifted to Port of Spain. The
Queen’s Park Oval has been India’s luckiest venue abroad, and
they proceeded to prove this beyond doubt by registering one of
the most remarkable victories in Test cricket.
Set a target of 403 for victory in a little over nine hours,
India reached their forbidding goal with seven of the last 20
mandatory overs to spare. Their final total of 406 for four
remains, over 800 Test matches later, the highest in the fourth
innings to win a Test match.
Planning their objective "with the perfection of a cricketing
Lester Piggott," as Tony Cozier wrote, India had Gavaskar (102)
and Viswanath (112) playing the strokes, while Mohinder Amarnath
(85 in 442 minutes) remained the perfect anchor-man. Patel (49
not out) applied the finishing touches to herald a glorious
triumph.
But the victory had some vicious, even scary, repercussions.
Lloyd came in for severe criticism, and he was under intense
pressure to win the final Test. It was his declaration that had
paved the way for the Indian triumph and, even earlier, the
humiliating loss in Australia had not gone down too well with the
West Indian cricket authorities, the press and the cricket fans.
For the final Test, therefore, he packed the side with a pace
quartet in Holding, Wayne Daniel, Bernard Julien and Vanburn
Holder, won the toss, and put India in to bat on a freshly laid
pitch.
With batting that was the apotheosis of courage, Gavaskar,
Anshuman Gaekwad and Mohinder Amarnath saw India past the 200-run
mark for the loss of only one wicket. Lloyd, by then, had
unleashed a bumper and beamer barrage, with Holding and Daniel
freely indulging in short-pitched intimidatory bowling that went
unchecked by the umpires. The result was that Gaekwad, Viswanath
and Patel suffered injuries, and they had to be taken to
hospital.
Bishan Singh Bedi declared the innings closed at 306 for six in
an effort to protect his bowlers from the brutal and unfair
attack. The West Indies then took a first-innings lead of 85, but
this assumed alarming proportions as the Indian injury list grew.
Bedi and Bhagwat Chandrasekhar sustained hand injuries while
fielding and were thus not in a position to bat.
With Gaekwad, Patel and Viswanath still out of action, India were
reduced to six batsmen, and the innings terminated at 97. Indeed,
all 17 members of the touring squad fielded at some stage during
the match, and Surinder Amarnath, who fielded as substitute for
much of the first innings, was operated on for appendicitis on
the fourth day. The West Indies won the match, scheduled for six
days, by 10 wickets with two days to spare.
Midway through the match, Bedi and manager Polly Umrigar held a
press conference at which they formally protested against the
intimidatory tactics of the West Indian pacemen. They made it
clear that, in their view, the tactics were unfair and
unwarranted, going against the spirit of the game. Lloyd, quite
predictably, retorted by asking whether the Indians expected
half-volleys. Manager Clyde Walcott asked the Indians to learn to
play fast bowling instead of cribbing.
Gavaskar, who was the vice-captain, later made some harsh
comments about Lloyd, Walcott and the West Indian tactics, also
describing the Jamaican crowd as "a mob of blood-thirsty
barbarians."
The controversial and unseemly end put into shade some fine
cricket played during the series, chiefly seen in the batting of
Richards, who got hundreds in each of the first three Tests, and
Gavaskar, who got his customary centuries in the two Port of
Spain Tests. There were also three-figure knocks to savour from
the blades of Patel, Viswanath, Lloyd and Kallicharran. There was
some excellent bowling too from Bedi and Chandrasekhar, who
picked up 18 and 21 wickets respectively.
However much the cricket thrilled, though, the series will be
mainly remembered for the bloodbath at Sabina Park and that is
very unfortunate indeed.
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