When Indians won the World Cup...

Elmo Rodrigopulle

Today seems like yesterday. It was on this day 25 years ago that cricket in India enjoyed and celebrated its most glorious day when Kapil Dev’s team upset the might of the West Indies led by Clive Lloyd to win the one-day international Derby - the World Cup.

I was there on a wonderful summer’s day at Lord’s in St. John’s Wood, in the media box covering the tournament for the Times group of newspapers with Clement Arnold, Lakshman Thalayasingham, Nanda Ranaweera and T.M.K. Samat taking in the thrill a minute action and gulping down the heart stopping action.

To first things first and in the run up to the tournament proper, Sri Lanka led by the mercurial Duleep Mendis met India in a warm-up game and believe it or not put the Indians to second best.

Then the cricketing miracle took place at the mecca of cricket when the Indians who struggled to enter the final, turned the form book upside down by beating the Windies by 43 runs to signal an excellent win that saw the Indians at the match, in the whole of India and others domiciled elsewhere toast their win and celebrate for days on end.

India would have found their way into the finals a little difficult if not for truly captain’s innings of 175 by skipper Dev when his side seemed to be sliding to defeat against Zimbabwe at Turnbridge Wells.

Dev came to the wicket with his side in the dumps at 17 for 4 and then 20 for 5. From the moment he took strike he made his intentions clear by wading into the Zimbabwe attack and despatching it to all corners of the field and over it as well in a truly magnificent captain’s innings.

Those who saw that innings described it as marvellous and predicted that there would never be another audacious and arrogant knock like the one produced by Dev. How true. To this day a knock has not been played like the way Dev did.

From that moment onwards there was no stopping the Indian jaggernaut. Came the final and on form the mighty West Indians were favourites to win the third World Cup in a row, and also grab and treasure the Cup for ever.

But they did not bargain for an Indian side that played like devils to shatter the Windies hopes and engrave their names on the glittering trophy, the ultimate in the one-day game.

Dev’s team was aptly described as devils. They played like possessed by devils to give India its most memorable cricketing moment.

In those days it was a 60-over final and when the Windies dismissed the Indians for 183, it seemed that victory would be foregone conclusion for the dazzlers from the Caribbean.

I can still picture the out of this world catch that Dev took off Vivian Richards who was going like a bullet, to signal the beginning of the end for the Windies.

Not being a statistician, if my memory serves me right I think Richards had made something like 28 with 6 fours and seemed poised to race his side to victory.

Madan Lal pitched a short of a length delivery and Richards in his eagerness to send the red cherry over the boundary, played a little too early and spooned the ball. Dev fielding at short mid wicket dashed like a hare for about 20 or 30 metres and took a miraculous catch, and that not only signalled the end of Richards but also his team.

With the Windies batting machine falling to pieces, Clive Lloyd was the only saviour. But batting with a runner having pulled a hamstring early in the game, he seemed helpless and it was unbelievable that the Windies had lost and the Indians had won.

Drinks was on the house courtesy Prudential Assurance and didn’t ‘Sam’, Lucky, Nanda and yours truly toast the Indian victory, because they deserved it and they were our neighbours.

In that 1983 World Cup tournament, Sri Lanka’s Asantha de Mel who is now chief selector had a dream run with his speed bolts capturing 18 wickets, which was indeed a grand performance.

That epoch making Indian team whose names should be writ in letters of gold were - Kapil Dev (Captain), Sunil Gavaskar, Krishnamachari Srikanth, Mohinder Amaranath, Yashpal Sharma, Sandeep Patil, Dilip Vengaskar, Kiriti Azad, Seyd Kirmani (WK), Roger Binny, Madan Lal, Balwinder Sandhu, Ravi Shastri and Sunil Valson.