Sourav Ganguly’s double hundred

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Bowl underarm for all he caresWell, at least his highest Test score’s higher than his highest one-day international score now. We saw his highest score in one-day internationals, 183 against Sri Lanka in the 1999 World Cup, and there are similarities with yesterday’s knock.

On both occasions Ganguly was largely overshadowed by his batting partner in a large partnership, before cashing in once his teammate had been dismissed. It was Yuvraj yesterday and it was Rahul Dravid in the World Cup.

Both Ganguly and Dravid had been sublime against Sri Lanka, but if you’d had to have picked a man of the match after 45 overs of India’s innings, when the game was all but decided, you’d have gone for Dravid, who’d looked a mite better and had scored a few more runs than Ganguly at the time of his dismissal.

However, Dravid’s departure seemed to be Ganguly’s cue to start launching the ball into the stands – he hit seven sixes in that innings.

If it sounds like we’re saying that Ganguly’s the kind of batsman who takes advantage of already-decimated bowling attacks, then we are to a degree, but we like that. We like sportsmen to have a bit of mercilessness about them.

Why should Sourav Ganguly take his foot off the pedal just because Sri Lanka’s bowlers are looking ragged or because Pakistan are down to three bowlers who don’t look international standard? Sod it. Hit a few more boundaries. It’s anything but Ganguly’s problem.

2 comments

  1. That innings against SL came very close to making me sob like a girl. I probably sniffled a bit and chopped some onions in a vague attempt at rescuing my manliness.

    Seven sixes, yes, but the ground was the size of a postage stamp. Can you tell that I don’t like Gangulululy?

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