Selection of Test venues: tradition goes for a toss

Think V.V.S. Laxman, and the first number that springs to mind is 281. There is more to the classy Hyderabadi than that epochal number — as evidenced by the title of his autobiography, 281 and Beyond — but Laxman’s career will forever be defined by 281.

After all, it was that knock which changed the landscape of Indian cricket, maybe even of Test cricket. It came against all odds; Australia were sitting on a 16-Test winning streak, had battered India into submission inside three days in the opening game of a three-match series in Mumbai just 10 days previously, and had understandably enforced the follow-on in the second Test after leading by 274 in the first innings.

Understandably, because in three previous completed innings in the series, India’s scores were 176, 219 and 171. For Steve Waugh to believe that 274 was far too many in the bank wasn’t fanciful; his crack bowling unit had taken only 58.1 overs, spread over an overnight break, to run through India in their first dig, so it made sense to strike when the iron was hot.

But what’s it they say about the best laid plans of men and mice? Despite an improved batting display in their second innings, India were still in trouble at 115 for three, Sachin Tendulkar dismissed for a second score of 10 in the match, when skipper Sourav Ganguly walked in at No. 5. Normally, he would have punched gloves with Rahul Dravid, his deputy. Instead, in what turned out to be a masterstroke, the man who greeted him in the middle was Laxman, promoted to No. 3 after his first-innings 59, the lone score of more than 25 in India’s 171.

Even when Ganguly helped Laxman add 117 for the fourth wicket, Australia were in control; at the captain’s dismissal, India were 42 short of making the Aussies bat again. Laxman and Dravid, maybe hurting inside at being demoted but never complaining because he was the ultimate team man, represented the last specialist pair. One more strike, and Australia were into Nayan Mongia and then the bowlers.

That one more strike, history will testify, was 376 runs and 104.1 overs in coming. Laxman and Dravid, who had had numerous grand alliances for South Zone in domestic cricket, reprised the jugalbandi at the grandest stage of all, batting through the entire fourth day unseparated. When Laxman was eventually dismissed on day five, he had overhauled Sunil Gavaskar’s 236 not out to produce India’s highest individual Test score. Dravid’s masterpiece ended on 180, Ganguly declared at 657 for seven, and Harbhajan Singh and Tendulkar combined to send the visitors packing for 212. India had somehow pulled off a miracle, winning by 171 runs to square the series and going on to complete a fairytale series triumph with a tense victory in the decider in Chennai.

An epic

That epic second Test in 2001, between March 11 and 15, unfolded at the theatre of dreams – and sometimes nightmares, too – that is Kolkata’s Eden Gardens. On day one of the game, Harbhajan became the first Indian to take a Test hat-trick. On day four, Laxman went past Gavaskar’s 236*. And on day five, India rewrote history by becoming only the third team to win a Test after being forced to follow-on.

Laxman, Dravid and Harbhajan played several other Tests at the Eden and enjoyed stellar successes, but not against Australia for the rest of their careers even though the Aussies toured India in 2004, 2008 and 2010 when the trio was still active. Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma and R. Ashwin, all retired from Test cricket, didn’t play Australia at the Eden at all. And now, it looks as if Jasprit Bumrah, acknowledged as the greatest all-format bowler of certainly his and potentially any generation, will join that elite list.

Welcome to the strange, quirky, predictably predictable world of Indian cricket. Eden Gardens is in good company, let’s not forget. One of Laxman’s less celebrated but no less magical knocks came at Mumbai’s Wankhede Stadium, also against Australia, in November 2004. It was the last match of a four-fixture faceoff; India trailed 0-2, having surrendered a Test series at home to the Antipodeans for the first time in more than three decades. Despite Shane Warne sitting out the ‘dead rubber’ on a minefield, they were rolled over for 104, to which the Aussies replied with 203. A 99-run lead on a surface of that nature was pure gold but Laxman and Tendulkar put on their dancing shoes, producing a veritable feast during which they made it seem as if they were batting on a shirtfront.

During a third-wicket alliance of 91, they drove Ricky Ponting ragged. Tendulkar weighed in with 55 of the very best, Laxman was subliminally brilliant during his 69. Even though Michael Clarke (6/9) sparked a spectacular collapse of six for 23, India defended 107 with tigerish zeal, Harbhajan and Murali Kartik bowling them to a 13-run victory with five for 29. Oh, what drama.

The 171-run heist in 2001 remains the last time India took on Australia at the Eden; the teams haven’t also met each other in a Test at the Wankhede since the 13-run jailbreak in 2004. So much for the weight of history, of celebrating ‘traditional’ centres, of doing everything to keep Test cricket ‘alive and vibrant’, as the Board of Control for Cricket in India loves to point out time and again.

That it’s not enough to merely provide lip service to maintaining the primacy of the five-day game has never been more apparent in the last few days, since the venues for the five-Test home series for the Border-Gavaskar Trophy beginning next January were announced. This is the first time since 1979-80 that the Aussies will be playing at least five Tests in India; of the one-time marquee Test centres, only Chennai’s M.A. Chidambaram Stadium has been considered worthy of staging a match of this import and pedigree. The others bestowed the privilege of playing host are Nagpur, Ranchi, Guwahati and Ahmedabad.

In the last few years, ever since the sprawling Narendra Modi Stadium replaced the old Sardar Patel Stadium in Motera in 2021, Ahmedabad has become a near-permanent stop in all big-ticket series/competitions. It’s hosted several Tests, among them against England and Australia, and it was where the final of the 50-over World Cup in 2023 and the T20 World Cup earlier this month were conducted. One can understand the desire to take World Cup and IPL finals to a ground that can house between 103,000 and 125,000 fans – depending on who one talks to – but whether its vastness alone is enough for Test matches to repeatedly be held there is another matter altogether.

New entrant

Now, jostling for pre-eminence is the Assam Cricket Association Stadium in Guwahati, which last November became India’s 30th Test venue. By no stretch of the imagination is Guwahati a ‘traditional’ cricketing centre. There is a huge clamour for white-ball fireworks, like it is in several non-Tier 1 cricketing venues in the country, but the patronage for the inaugural Test at the ground, against recently crowned World Test champions South Africa, was worse than disappointing. For Guwahati to be given the opportunity to hold another Test against one of the top teams in the world is a massive surprise, but only when you disregard the fact that the current secretary of the BCCI hails from that part of the country. Power centres in sports associations will inevitably shift and be redefined, but should staging centres follow suit depending on who occupies the corridors of power? What happened to the acclaimed rotation policy aimed at equitable distribution of matches across the length and the breadth of the country? Given India’s size, the immense revenue generated by the BCCI and the distribution of much of that revenue to its member associations to improve cricketing infrastructure, among other things, India boast a plethora of world-class stadiums. The rotation system was introduced to ensure that everyone got their fair share of matches but now it’s a system that exists either only on paper or in one’s imagination because clearly, in reality, it has been given the heave-ho.

Audiences for Test matches have been dwindling in India for a while now, which makes it imperative for those entrusted with deciding which matches are played where to figure out which are the centres where there is still a demand for the red-ball format. There are enough limited-overs internationals – meaningful or otherwise – to be distributed to the others. It is essential that Test cricket isn’t spread thin by doling out its staging rights to all and sundry. How will Shubman Gill and Bumrah, Steve Smith and Pat Cummins, be energised by having to play high-stakes, high-profile Tests in front of less than 5,000 spectators, several of whom have been ferried through inducements rather than out of a great love for the game? Are we so caught up in the game of one-upmanship that the actual game becomes a casualty?

There is much to commend the BCCI for. The number of matches it conducts annually – and seamlessly – across genders and age groups is staggering. It hasn’t been miserly with its vast coffers, taking care of not just its members (vote banks, if you like, though developments over the last decade have precluded the need for elections in recent AGMs) but also of the players – both international and domestic. It hasn’t been so blinded by the lure of the lucre that it has neglected the grassroots. It’s credit to the governing body in the country that it has managed to attract and hold the interest of several legends, including Ravi Shastri, Dravid and Laxman, among others, in coaching and administrative roles with an eye on both the present and the future.

For all its commitment to the sport and its practitioners, it has still been a soft target for many with an axe to grind. But it must also acknowledge that one mustn’t just be fair but must also be seen to be fair. And surely, there isn’t a lot fair in cricket-crazy fans in Kolkata and Mumbai waiting 25 and 22 years respectively, unsuccessfully, to welcome an India vs Australia Test match?