With the final against Sri Lanka just two days away, the team itself may have quickly shifted its focus to calming its nerves and preparing for that massive game against Sri Lanka. But it appeared as if all India, unconcerned yet about the preparations for the final, was in a celebratory mood.

Each of us lost no time in picking our favourite freeze frames from the match. And those who had questioned skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s wisdom in choosing left-arm paceman Ashish Nehra over spin bowler R Ashwin quickly overcome such thoughts and joined the bandwagon of praise for his assured captaincy.

There was one frame that etched itself on my mind and I have to thank Shahid Afridi and Zaheer Khan – and their smiles – for that. Afridi chipped Zaheer Khan to mid-wicket and the ball dropped just short of the fielder there and managed just a single. As Afridi complete the run, he must have exchanged notes with Zaheer and they both broke into a smile. It was a lovely sight.

Of course, there were as many such scenes during the game – be it Harbhajan Singh exulting after bowling Umar Akmal or Sachin Tendulkar after taking a catch to dismiss Wahab Riaz or Mahendra Singh Dhoni uncharacteristically rushing to congratulate Harbhajan Singh on his claiming a wicket or Munaf Patel being hugged by Suresh Raina and Virender Sehwag.

Come to think of it, we loved the amazing spirit with which the teams played the match. Despite the unprecedented hype and hoopla that preceded the game, there was not a hint of acrimony on the field that some expected in the high-voltage clash. This was highlighted when Ashish Nehra did not claim a catch after fling himself forward at deep mid-wicket.

Our hearts also reached out when Afridi showed grace at the post-match presentations and poignantly when he unhesitatingly said “I want to say sorry to the people of Pakistan.” He knew India was the superior team and he knew that his team had to do something out of the ordinary to beat India in Mohali – and the closest that it went to that was Wahab Riaz’s incisive bowling.

Quite inevitably, as sonn as the cricket ball found safety in Virat Kohli’s hands to signal the completion of the match, India erupted in joy. The ultra-rich and the poor were all bound by a common thread that delighfully spelt victory. A diverse nation was united by emotions like relief and satisfaction, delight and, above all, national pride.

Cell phones across the country were buzzing, with calls and text messages dominaing the air waves; News TV channels forgot how they had raised questions about this team’s ability when it tied with England and lost to South Africa and tirelessy talking through the night about India’s victory over Pakistan and its after-effects. FM stations joined the festivities, too.

Thursday’s newspapers were expectedly euphoric, with cricket and ‘cricket diplomacy’ taking up most of the frontpage space. “After this… the Cup’s a Bonus” said one headline, reflecting the thoughts of most fans. A dispassionate observer may be forgiven if he thought that India had already won the ICC Cricket World Cup 2011, except of course for some exceptional reminders.

Yet, I would like you to pause for a moment and think: Does it need only a victory on the field of sport for India to feel proud of itself? Should we not seek such success in many other walks of life? Should we depend on cricket alone – and less frequently, other sport – to raise the morale of our nation and our self-esteem? Should we invest all our emotions in cricket?

I remember speaking with a wonderful ad-man Piyush Pandey some weeks ago and he pointed out that we are not competing so visibly against anyone in other areas and hence cricket causes such mass sentiments. Our film stars are not up against their contemporaries from Hollywood.  And when composer AR Rahman wins an Oscar or two, we do break out in some celebrations.

To be sure, cricket has fuelled an aggression in India but we desperately need such success in other streams of life too.The sooner our nation finds them the better it will be for us as we ride the bullish emotion and get ready to take on the world. Until that happens, we have much to thank the Indian cricket team for.

To me, Wednesday night was not just about the emotional outpouring of a cricket-crazy nation. It was about this wonderful country’s eagerness to be bound as one; it is about its diverse peoples collective desire to encourage success. The question is: who or what else is ready to capture the imagination of vast majority of the 1.2 billion people and make their hearts swell with pride.

(This piece has been written for Hindi newspaper Prabhat Khabar)

For instance, Mahendra Dhoni’s captaincy – be it his decision (in conjuction with fellow selectors) to retain Suresh Raina in the XI ahead of Yusuf Pathan, consequent to Virender Sehwag’s return or the bowling changes that he rung in – was top notch. The team’s fielding – so often criticised – was rung above the usual.

Zaheer Khan’s response to his captain’s call for wickets or R Ashwin’s nerveless bowling in Powerplay, Sachin Tendulkar’s intensity at the start of the run-chase, Gautam Gambhir’s sheer will power to contribute to the team’s cause despite obvious sluggishness and Raina’s maturity during his match-winning stand with Yuvraj Singh are all more cases in point.

Yet, no team can be satisfied with the old philosophy that said ‘You are as good as your last performance.’ That has to be tweaked to the present times when a team is only as good as its preparation and its current performance.

Yes, it is time to move on – not just for the Indian team as it travels to Mohali but also for fans and critics. The nature of competition in the knockout stage is such that it severely punishes teams every time for playing below par. And the converse is not always true: sides are not often rewarded for raising the bar.

The biggest challenge for the Indian team, therefore, as it prepares to take on Pakistan in its next high-voltage game is to take its collective mind off that amazing effort against Australia and move on. If the squad lingers for long in the afterglow of a fine victory in Motera, its preparations for Mohali can be affected.

I remember how, in 1996, three days after an emotionally-charged game against Pakistan in Bangalore, India capitulated in the semifinal to Sri Lanka at the Eden Gardens in Calcutta. A lot of reasons have been attributed to that loss but I have always suspected that the team was not able to recoup its emotional energy quickly enough.

Yet, I also recall how in the span of three days India beat Australia 2-0 in the best-of-three finals of the Commonwealth Bank Series in 2008. It tells me that the modern Indian teams have evolved and can handle the task of recharging the emotional batteries quite well.

Set to coincide with Australian Foreign Minister Stephen Smith’s visit to the Indian Capital, the decision to institute a trophy to honour two legends – Ajitpal Singh and Ric Charlesworth – this decision is reminiscent of the ping pong diplomacy route that the United States and China took to achieve a thaw in their relationship back in the 70s.

There have always been calls round the world to keep politics away from sports but world leaders — statesmen and politicians alike – have found it a convenient platform to further diplomatic moves through sport. It is hard not to recall some such instances, not the least being Pakistan President Gen. Zia-ul-Haq’s trip to Jaipur for a cricket Test match in 1987.

Then in 1996 when Australia and the West Indies withdrew from their World Cup cricket matches in Sri Lanka, India and Pakistan got together to field a joint side in a friendly game against the home side to show the world that it was safe to travel to the tear-drop island in Indian Ocean.

I remember watching the telecast of the ICC Cricket World Cup 2003 match between India and Pakistan in Centurion Park and the attempt by the two captains, Sourav Ganguly and Waqar Younis, to remind their fans that this was but a game of cricket and not to see it as proxy war as has become the norm.

Back in 2004, India’s Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee told the cricket team before it left for Pakistan that it was important not only to win at the sport but also to win hearts in Pakistan. The camaraderie that existed on that tour is firmly embedded on the minds of all those privileged to be on that tour, with 8000 Indian fans sitting alongside their Pakistani counterparts.

There is no doubt that sport has the power to facilitate healing of fractured societies. And Australia has taken the initiative to institute a trophy to honour two legends, one the captain of the Indian team that won the World Cup hockey in 1975 and an Australian who was a member of the 1986 side that won the World Cup and has been a successful coach too.

Charlesworth, who is here as Australia coach, saw his team being at the receiving end during its game against England – not just because it lost 2-3 but also because the crowd, steadily building up for India’s match against Pakistan that followed, was lined up against it.  Clearly, the fans were making a gentle statement about the attacks against a number of Indians in Australia.

This piece was written for www.stick2hockey.com

The Indian players set off on a victory lap after beating Pakistan 4-1 in their opening match at the FIH World Cup

The man of the match Sandeep Singh scored once in each half while Shivendra Singh and Prabhjot Singh pumped in one each as India piled immense pressure on the Pakistan defence. Yet, it was really the Indian midfield that won the day and helped India win 4-1. And none shone brighter than Bharat Chikara who gave Rehan Butt little elbow room to showcase his magical skills.

In a sport in which the focus is usually on the strikers and, less frequently, the goalkeepers, it needs a command performance from a midfielder to steal the thunder from under everyone else’s nose. And Bharat Chhikara did just that – and to make things so much better, the Haryana player with just over 50 caps did it without much ado.

To say that he shadowed Rehan Butt would be taking away the sheen from Bharat Chikara’s efforts. For shadowing entails being in the slipstream of the rival player. On the contrary, the tough left-half was half a step ahead of the Pakistan spearhead and almost intuitively anticipated his every twist, every feint right through the game.

It is another matter that the midfielder thought his performance was quite average. “I gave Rehan Butt some room early on and I think I could have been better,” he told me after the match when the media largely ignored him and pursued the scorers. “I got a fair idea of how he thinks and moves from the match in the Champions Challenge I in Argentina in December last.”

But he can draw heart from the fact that coach Jose Brasa picked him and Sardara Singh as the Indian players of the night. “We were better than Pakistan in all our lines – be it defence, midfield or forwards – but I know that we could have played better,” he said. “Having said that, I believe Bharat and Sardara led the team’s collective effort.”

Truth to tell, the others in the Indian midfield played their hearts out as well, falling back deep to defend but showing no hesitation in pressing forward and forcing Pakistan to be on the backfoot much of the time, ensuring that goalkeeper P R Sreejesh was rarely tested.  On a night when the woodwork favoured India by blocking two of Sohail Abbas’s penalty corner strikes, the intensity that Bharat Chikara displayed was matched by his team-mates.

Sardara Singh, for example, showed nerves of steel and a large heart as he played the pivotal role in ensuring that many Pakistan moves did not assume dangerous proportions and the Indian attack was well fed. Arjun Halappa and Dhananjay Mahadik had their moments as well on a night when India’s collective effort – and this included the pressure exerted from the stands — outweighed Pakistan.

This piece was written for www.stick2hockey.com

Indian ace Deepak Thakur believes the team is mentally strong to take on Pakistan in the opening game of the FIH World Cup

Live everyone else, I am excited by the approaching India-Pakistan contest in the Hero Honda FIH World Cup 2010 at the Maj. Dhyan Chand National Stadium in Delhi. It has been a little over six years since I sat in the packed stands and cheered a 3-1 India victory in the Afro-Asian Games final in my home town, Hyderabad. The goalless draw that I saw the teams play out at the Morris Brown College ground in Atlanta at the 1996 Olympic Games has faded into the recesses.

For someone who has found the sporting rivalry between the two neighbours endearing, I cannot help think of how India will have to be mentally strong to face the twin pressures that bear down on the team in the World Cup competition. It is known to be among the slow starters in the big competitions and, to make it doubly challenging, the opening game is with Pakistan.

May be it is just a myth that India starts slowly but let us look at the last two major events for the Indian team. India got off to a 2-2 draw with New Zealand in the Champions Challenge in Argentina in December. Earlier, in the Asia Cup in May 2009, despite goals from Prabhjot Singh and Rajpal Singh, the team lost 2-3 to – hold your breath – Pakistan.

It does look like the home team has approached its two warm up games against Argentina and the Netherlands as part of a big tournament rather than as practice matches. I was happy with the intensity that we saw in the squad when it took on and beat the Dutch 2-1 in a practice game a couple of evenings earlier.

I have always believed that it is mental strength that makes the difference between champions and also-rans and it was but natural that when I got to talk one of the Indian team’s stars, Deepak Thakur, our conversation focused mainly on the team’s mental preparations for the big game that lies ahead.

Apparently, the team has kept things simple. It has had some sessions with a psychologist. But more importantly the events away from the hockey pitch have brought the players together like little else could have. “Above all, we have a solid coach (Jose Brasa) who is very good at keeping us motivated,” Deepak Thakur said.

“We have put behind us the defeats by Pakistan in the Asia Cup in Malaysia and the Champions Challenge in Argentina,” he said. “We realise that there is no point in letting thoughts of such reverses linger in our minds. We know our strengths and are focussed on bringing them to the fore when we get on the pitch for the opening game.”

Indeed, as far as the opening game is concerned, mind games have already begun. There has been of talk about how drag-flickers Sohail Abbas and Sandeep Singh will be key performers. And how Indian goalkeeper Adrian d’Souza exudes confidence that he can measure up to the challenge posed by the world’s most prolific goal scorer Sohail Abbas’ exceptional skills.

Typical of players of an era gone by, the greybeards talk of how the intensity in contemporary India-Pakistan matches is less than in the past. It is an unfair comment given that millions of people watch the game on television and sit in judgment now more than ever. I believe that any India-Pakistan sporting contest brings along immense stress.

And yes, even if I am not looking beyond India’s inaugural match with Pakistan, I am excited at being able to watch my first World Cup hockey competition.

This article was written for www.stick2hockey.com and appeared on that wonderful website.

Nor, for that matter, will it indicate how Pakistan themselves have bounced back from virtual isolation in world cricket in the wake of the Lahore attack. The final will be much more than usual T20 cricket game – it will be an amalgam of myriad emotions and yet players will have to shut out and concentrate on the ball.

To be sure, this is more than a simple game of cricket. If you look carefully beyond the cricket, you may find some dark emotions that the player so dearly want to drive away. And if you get past those as well, you may find other wonderful emotions, notably hope that flickers and powers them – and the peoples they represent.

“I think it is a fitting reward for the courage that the team has shown in this tournament,” Sri Lanka captain Kumar Sangakkara said after the semifinal win over the West Indies. “What Lahore got home to us was the fact that we are just the same as anyone else. It is great the way the guys have prepare mentally and we are concentrating on cricket.”

The genial Pakistan captain Younis Khan also indicated that the ICC World Twenty20 would mean a lot to the people of Pakistan. “Our law and order situation is not the best; there is a lot of fighting going on,” he said. “If we win this title, it will be a good change for my people – especially those from the north where I hail from.”

To sit down and assess the cricketing talent of the sides squaring up in the second successive all-Asian Derby in the final of the ICC World Twenty20 would be in some ways reducing the beauty of this game that amply reflects the life and times we live in, mirrors the society in which the teams learn and play their cricket.

On March 3, when gunmen attack the Sri Lankan team bus and left the cricket world wounded permanently, few would have wagered on the team from the teardrop island in the Indian Ocean and the side from a nation that is ravaged by strife making it to the title clash of the first ICC competition.

But it is a tribute to the competitive spirit of the men from both nations that they have not only willed themselves on but have beaten some very good sides to make it to the final. And, what is more, the two teams have kept a low profile, Sri Lanka despite winning all six games in the tournament so far.

Now, Sri Lanka and Pakistan – armed with sets of wonderfully gifted cricketers with different skill sets but united by a singularity of purpose – will have to send all thoughts and emotions to the sub-conscious and focus on optimising the talent over 40 overs so they can lay their hands on the coveted prize.

The teams:

Sri Lanka (from): Kumar Sangakkara (captain, wicket-keeper), Sanath Jayasuriya, Tillekeratne Dilshan, Mahela Jayawardene, Chamara Silva, Jehan Mubarak, Angelo Mathews, Lasith Malinga, Muttiah Muralitharan, Ajantha Mendis, Isuru Udana. Indika de Saram, Nuwan Kulasekara, Farvez Maharoof and Thilan Thushara.

Pakistan (from): Younis Khan (captain), Kamran Akmal (wicket-keeper), Shahzaib Hasan, Shahid Afridi, Shoaib Malik, Misbah-ul-Haq, Abdul Razzaq, Fawad Alam, Saeed Ajmal, Mohammad Aamer, Umar Gul, Salman Butt, Sohail Tanvir, Ahmed Shehzad and Iftikhar Anjum.

A journalist friend of mine from Bangladesh, asked me what I would do at T20. It is for P3 reporters, he taunted. But I had made my commitment to watch the cricket for whatever it was worth and enjoy the opportunity of watching the game. Perhaps, pegging expectations low helped and I have a feast that I am unlikely to forget in a hurry.

Two weeks after the first ball was bowled, I am now in the Press Box at the Wanderers, awaiting the excitement of covering the final between India and Pakistan. Had you told me a fortnight ago that the sub-contintental neigbours would be playing for the $490,000 top prize, I may have laughed it off as wishful thinking. But two amazing weeks have changed all that.

With only the final left to be played, I look back at my experience over the past fortnight and believe that game is for the smart cricketer, the fan in a hurry and the young journalist who can find news ways to describe the whole range of emotions that players and fans alike go through in the span of three hours at each match.

I had not even settled down in the press box at the Kingsmead Cricket Ground in Durban when New Zealand pace bowlers Shane Bond and Mark Gillespie claimed four Kenya wickets for one run in the first two overs. The excitement hasn’t stopped flowing since and we have been lucky that we have got a day’s break between matches.

There are so many wonderful memories already. A tie in the India-Pakistan league game and then the bowl out that saw India win 3-0. Indian left-hander Yuvraj Singh’s six sixes off England pace bowler Stuart Broad, Australian paceman Brett Lee’s hat-trick, Pakistan leg-spinner Shahid Afridi’s nagging accuracy. Some stunning games tested my nerve, too.

And now, just 40 overs remain to be bowled for the winner and loser to be separated. I had never imagined that I would be at a T20 final and one featuring India and Pakistan at that! The Wanderers has provided a great atmosphere, thousands of Asians filling in what they call the Bull Ring, waving flags of the two nations and inspiring the DJ on location to play music from the sub-continent.

I have been to Test matches and one-day internationals featuring the two teams in India and Pakistan and in one-day games in places like Sharjah, Colombo and Old Trafford and Southampton in England. And have felt the needle, becoming an unwilling party of the hype that surrounds such matches. Happily, that needle has been absent – or so I would like to believe.

I have had goose pimples at cricket grounds many times but never like I did when the teams had lined up for the national anthems of the two countries at the Wanderers on Monday. India’s Jana Gana Mana and then Pakistan’s Pak Sarzamin resounded at the stadium.