India's win in Kanpur was an edge-of-the-seat thriller, inspired heavily from what transpired in Adelaide ten years ago, writes Sarah Waris.
India’s fearless pursuit of victory in Kanpur was like no other. Up against Bangladesh, Rohit Sharma’s team, looking for crucial World Test Championship points, came back after two-and-a-half frustrating days of washouts with an unshakeable belief to clinch the game that, at one point, seemed as lifeless as an unassuming bite of paan sold across the stadium.
The India bowlers bowled their hearts out, the fielders jumped backwards and frontwards, literally, at every opportunity, the batters pushed the Bazball frenetics into overdrive. As the team notched up a famous win after batting just 312 balls, the fourth-fewest to clinch a Test, skipper Rohit Sharma and coach Gautam Gambhir were credited with transforming the way India approached the format.
While beating the external factors and batting with an unheard-of run rate needs to be praised, for what India did on days four and five in Kanpur were indeed manic, the vision is not alien.
Nearly ten years ago, when there was no desperation to claim WTC points and the risk of tarnishing the start of a long captaincy tenure was immense, Virat Kohli stepped out from the shadows of MS Dhoni to bring about a much-needed revitalisation Test cricket didn’t know it needed. It turned out to be a match that reshaped the ethos of Indian cricket, and arguably, in hindsight, world cricket.
