Farewell to Sourav Ganguly - the epitome of India's fighting spirit By Sanjay Mehta, on 10th November 2008, 03:32 UTC

Views104 Comments0 Sport What an emotional rollercoaster for Sourav Ganguly. Coming out to bat for the ve ry last time for India, the whole ground rising in a standing ovation, the Austr alian team giving him an ovation, struggling to focus on the game and the first ball... Luckily for him, a spinner is bowling. An Australian debutant spinner, someone D ada would normally be ready to face, even if he had just been woken up from a de ep slumber. Couldn't get easier than that, could it? But the innocuous turn of the wrist on that first ball was a shade too early, re sulting in a leading edge off the bat, and the debutant bowler lunged forward to pick up a return catch. First ball dismissal. A golden duck to end an illustrio us career. The long walk back to the pavilion, accompanied first by stunned silence as the fans tried to grasp what had just happened, and then thundering last applause fo r their favourite Dada, who had entertained them so brilliantly over the years. Suddenly it was all over. It seems that Sourav went into the pavilion and did not remove his pads for at l east 20 minutes. Intense cricketer that he is, one cannot imagine what could be going through his mind. Is it finally, finally over? Did that just happen? Oh my God! A century in his first innings and a duck in his last innings. It kind of exempl ifies the ups and downs that Sourav has had in his career, the highs and lows ex perienced by his fans over the years. When he was on song, he was the most entertaining batsman in the game, bar none. Two steps down the pitch and the beautiful swing to send the ball into the stan ds at long on, or his picture-perfect square drive to give fielders no hope of r eaching it on its way to the boundary. Shots that we will not mind seeing again and again on video replays. Yet there were times when he struggled badly against the rising delivery going a cross his body. He was a sucker for even a medium-fast bowler, so painful for fa ns to see (yours truly, included). But those were the kind of highs and lows tha t Sourav-da gave his fans. The fact that he dug himself out after that struggle against the rising delivery and after being unceremoniously dropped from the team, was mind blowing. Many o ther players would have opted to just let things go by, retire, enjoy family lif e, become a commentator or whatever. But Sourav showed his grit and determination, something that we have seen so oft en against tough opponents like Australia and England. Sourav worked at the nets , played club cricket, played the Ranji Trophy, went to English county cricket.. . did everything that he could, to get back to form, and ensure that the selecto rs could not ignore his performance any more. He came back to the team, not on the strength of friendly selectors, but on the strength of his performance.

And that was the true test of his pedigree. Could he deliver again at the highes t level? It was a different Sourav on his return. He didn't seem to chat as much with his old friends, just wanting to show the world what he is capable of. She er hard work, intense determination and great concentration ensured that he got runs. And got them big. And the world acknowledged him again. While Sachin Tendulkar has been lauded as the force of Indian cricket for many y ears, I truly believe that the one person responsible for the genuine turnaround of Indian cricket, of instilling within the team that self-belief, of competing with the best in the world on equal terms was Sourav Ganguly. And he has now played his last innings for India. Farewell, Sourav. You have giv en us a lot of entertainment, and we will miss you.

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