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Birthplace of the pinch hitter
Wisden CricInfo staff - January 27, 2002
Tomorrow, Kanpur will host its ninth one-day international - and ominously for England, India have won five of the seven previous matches they have played there.
That upstart who doesn't know his place in the order, the one-day pinch hitter, made his first significant appearance at Kanpur. In 1989-90 Chetan Sharma was promoted to No. 4 when India played England, and proceeded to slog Graham Gooch (0 for 37 from 5.1 overs) and David Capel (0 for 24 from 3) to all parts, ending up with an unbeaten 101 from only 96 balls. The Wisden Almanack report was sniffy - "little more than a slog" - but Sharma's innings was effective, helping India overhaul England's 255 for 7 (Allan Lamb 91, Alec Stewart 61) with six wickets and 11 balls to spare. It was the ultimate flash-in-the-pan innings; in his other 64 one-day matches Sharma only once made more than 22. His Kanpur firework display remains the only one-day hundred made by a genuine tailender playing as a pinch hitter.
India have played in seven of Kanpur's eight previous one-dayers, and have won five of them. They started inauspiciously in 1986-87, recording the lowest total made in an ODI in India: 78 against Sri Lanka on a pitch that had been used recently and then watered. But since then they have lost only once in six games at Green Park, against West Indies in 1994-95.
Ominously for England, several members of the current Indian team seem to reserve some of their best performances for Kanpur. Sourav Ganguly has made 72 and 71* in his two games here, against Australia in 1997-98 and Zimbabwe in 2000-01 (he also took 5 for 34 in that game). Javagal Srinath recorded his second-best ODI figures here, with 5 for 24 v Sri Lanka in 1993 - still the best analysis at Kanpur. And Agit Agarkar ran him close against Zimbabwe in 2000-01, with 4 for 46 - his best one-day figures until the second match of the current series at Chennai, when he took 4 for 34.
Bowlers have tended to be more successful than batsmen at Kanpur. Big scores are rare - there have been only five totals of over 230 from 16 innings. The highest was 259, by India v England in 1989-90. Vinod Kambli, an outcast from the Indian team these days, holds the record for the highest individual score here, with 106 v Zimbabwe in 1995-96.
The toss doesn't seem to be crucial. Four games have been won by the side batting first, and four by the side batting second.
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