That ENIGMA....AJIT AGARKAR!

I am sitting in office going through this document filled with details about some new technology...phew....but too often for any meaningful work to be done, I 'Alt-Tab'ed and read through the previews and predictions for the 2nd match between India and Pakistan. As always, the team composition is discussed and debated at length. And as always, Ajit Agarkar is the second most mentioned man in these articles. Almost everyone wants him out. They feel that he is blocking R.P.Singh (who seems to have leapfrogged Zaheer Khan...IMPRESSIVE!).

So, I closed the document. It was 3pm already. Loooong day! And opened up StatsGuru and looked up AA's record. It reads 26 matches, 58 wickets, average of 47 and a S/R of .....well, I couldnt find it in his career summary, but then, you get the picture....Still, amidst the ruins, a best of 6/41 stands out. Is it because those are the only numbers worth a mention there? Well, YES! and NO!!!. Here's why...

An Indian test win in an away series is a rarity even though SAURAV's boys managed to almost double our tally of total away wins within a 4 yr period. And a win in AUS, against a STEVE WAUGH led team, after conceding 500 odd in the first innings....Well, I watched that performance and will always play it over and over in my mind. It was that sort of an occasion and the performance matched it.

But that isnt the occasion that I started the one man fan club of AA. That club was started long long ago. Not when he scored a test century at Lords, not when he scored the fastest 50 by an Indian in ODIs, not even when he was the fastest man ever to 50 ODI wickets (cheap shot, I agree...but cant be bothered about decency when crumbs are all I got)...my fascination with AA goes back even further.

It was the late 90s....I just googled it and it turns out to be early 1998...when India's A team toured PAK. This lad was a 19 yr old of whom I had never ever heard about. And then started the test series between India A and Pak A. Pak A had a strong team filled with quite a few test discards (Aaqib Javed, Basit Ali among others) while our team was a talented inexperienced youthful one. There was no video coverage of the tour, so, I followed it through the newspaper (Internet hadnt entered my life then) and the SPORTSTAR. I was not overly excited by this tour since it wasnt exactly international cricket. But an India-Pak encounter can have strange hypnotic effects.

India batted first and made a huge score. They had no trouble negating Aaqib and co and I presumed (and probably read) that it was a flat wicket. So, I expected a backlash when we got the ball in our hands. The rains came down and disrupted their innings. It was a 4 day 'test' and at the end of it, we got only a few overs against them. I dont have any recollection of the second test...except that it rained there too but in between, we managed to dominate them with the BALL, I would have assume (reasons later).

The third test was a thriller and we managed to beat them with Bahutule (the captain, I think) ending up as MoM for his efforts with bat and ball. The fact that India had beaten Pak in their backyard was a big deal to me (Fact of the matter is, our H to H record against them is sooo skewed, that any victory is HUGE for us). Alright, well and good, but am I fascinated with AA only because he was one of the members of the victorious 'A' team? Again NO.

What I failed to mention about the first test was that, in the short time that we managed to bowl, we had them tottering for the loss of atleast 3 wickets. AA got going and was unplayable by all accounts. And he continued doing the same during the third test. At the end of the series, I vaguely recall reading that he had a total of 16 wickets in '3 and a little bit more' completed Pak innings. One of the compeleted innings had to be the second test since 2 complete innings were in the 3rd test and we didnt get to bowl them out in the 1st test.

Those numbers are phenomenal, arent they? To completely outbowl Aaqib and Pak's long line of quickies takes some doing as I am sure everyone is aware. And then came the clincher, the reason for the fan club, the reason for me sticking my neck out every time he is on the field, the reason for me rambling on for sooo long...the reports from out there unanimously mentioned that AJIT AGARKAR, that lean skinny 19 yr old, tortured and tormented the quality batsman in the opposition lineup while operating with SEVEN SLIPS !!!

Those words stuck to my heart and will always remain there. And so, until my heart beats there is no escaping the fact that I will be blowing AA's trumpet each and every time he gets a tailender with a waist high full toss.

FYI....Except for the time of the Indian tour and AA's stats, everything about the tour is from memory (which is why the account is filled with 'assume', 'vaguely recall' etc). I wholeheartedly acknowledge the possibility of someone pointing out some glaring statistical mistakes in the account. But until we get our own Wasim or Shoaib, this memory is too close to the heart to be damaged by 'mere facts'.

AJIT AGARKAR Forever!!!