Indo-Australian Relations: Encounters Beyond the State Edition 1 by Philip Darby

Author:Philip Darby [Darby, Philip]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781138184831
Google: uGObjgEACAAJ
Barnesnoble:
Goodreads: 29389625
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2016-07-26T00:00:00+00:00

Symonds, Singh and simians in Sydney9

The 2007–2008 test series between India and Australia came in the aftermath of some intensely fought tests between the two countries. While Australia had established itself as one of the best teams in the history of the game over the preceding decade, the Indians had played them hard. Steve Waugh’s quest to conquer the final frontier (a series win in India had eluded the Aussies since 1969–1970) crumbled in Kolkata’s dust and Chennai’s heat in the early 2000s. In the following series in Australia, the Indians held their own, coming within hailing distance of winning the series itself. Waugh’s famed ‘mental disintegration’ of the opposing captain had backfired as the Indian captain Saurav Ganguly had the measure of his opponent when it came to mind games. The stage was set for another fierce encounter in the ’07–’08 edition, but the first test (at Melbourne) had ended with a very lopsided defeat for India. In the second test in Sydney, at the mid-point, the teams were locked in a fierce contest.

Batting first, the Australians were in dire straits at 134 for 6, with the allrounder Andrew Symonds at the crease with only the tailenders to come. Symonds hit an unbeaten 162 to carry the Australians to a very solid 463. He had nicked one to the wicket-keeper when still in his 30s but the umpire had not spotted it. Symonds stood out in the all-white Australian team with his mixed Afro-Caribbean and white parentage. His adoptive white parents had brought him to Australia while he was still very young and he had been raised in that country. With his dreadlocks and chiselled physique Symonds seemed to embody black athletic prowess.

When the Indians batted, their top order carried them to 345 for 7—still over a hundred runs behind the Aussies who were now circling to polish off the tail. At this point, India’s batting star (and by some distance the world’s richest cricketer) Sachin Tendulkar and the feisty off-spinner Harbhajan Singh put on a stubborn partnership of 129 runs that overhauled the Aussie score. Singh had been a major architect of Australia’s defeat in the famed 2001 series and gave as good as he got when it came to sledging. He was not from Dravid’s middle-class background and was part of a newer generation of Indian cricketers—from the small town rather than the big city, not fluent in English, and unburdened by too deep a knowledge and reverence for the history of the game and its traditions. He had planned to head to the Middle East as a truck driver when cricketing success had thrown him a lifeline. Early in his career he had once said that his earnings from cricket would help him marry off his sisters and buy his parents a longed-for home back in Punjab.

Midway through their rearguard action, there occurred an incident which became the flashpoint for an acrimonious and ugly controversy that brought issues of race, gender, nation and the new economic power structure that underlay cricket to the centre.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.