Since its inception, one-day cricket’s sky high popularity
and tremendous ability to generate revenues made the International Cricket
Council (ICC) think about staging a multi-national tournament like the FIFA
World Cup. To hold a tournament of Test matches was impossible because of the
constraint of time and huge expenses. But in case of one-day cricket such
problems didn’t exist.
So, after a lot of planning and debate, the first cricket
World Cup was staged in England
in 1975. The Prudential Insurance Company, who had been sponsoring one-day
matches between England
and a visiting team from 1972, became the first official sponsors of the
inaugural World Cup.
Worried organizers and sponsors
The opening match of the tournament between England
and India had
been a poor advisement of limited-overs cricket. India ’s
response to England ’s
mammoth total was dodgy and it simply soared and incensed a capacity crowd at
Lord’s. Then there were more one-sided matches which made the organizers and
sponsors worried about this new concept. They started to think whether it would
be sensible enough to exercise such concepts in future.
But the organizers and sponsors’ worried faces ebbed away
after Pakistan
and West Indies dished out an absolute humdinger at Birmingham .
In a glorious afternoon, two of cricket’s most mercurial teams gifted a
nerve-jangler which gave the tournament a new life.
During that time, both Pakistan
and West Indies had some charismatic talents in their
team. Players like Gordon Greenidge, Viv Richards, Majid Khan, Zaheer Abbas,
Mushtaq Mohammad, Clive Lloyd, Andy Roberts and Sarfraz Nawaz were the
spectators’ favourite sons and they didn’t offer any dullness even for a single
moment.
While the West Indies started the
tournament in dominating fashion, the Pakistanis failed to live up to the
expectations.
Must win game for Pakistan
In their group match against Australia, Dennis Lillee had
blown away the Pakistan batting line-up with sheer pace and for which, the next
match against West Indies became very much important for Pakistan. They had to
win that match to remain afloat in the tournament. The Pakistani captain Asif
Iqbal couldn’t play due to an illness and thus, Majid Khan was captaining Pakistan
on that day. Asif’s absence didn’t create any headache in the Pakistani camp as
the highly talented Wasim Raja, who boasted a terrific record against the West
Indian pacers, replaced him.
The Birmingham
stadium was jam-packed. Both the Pakistani and West Indian supporters triggered
an absolute carnival atmosphere. The crowd was noisy and it seemed that the
match was taking place either at Barbados
or Karachi .
Pakistan post a
fighting total
Majid Khan won the toss and elected to bat first. The
Pakistanis lost Sadiq Mohammad early, but it didn’t matter much as Majid and
Zaheer notched-up a 62-run stand for the second wicket. Richards’ part-time off
spin bowling broke the Majid-Zaheer partnership.
Mushtaq Mohammad joined Majid and added 57 runs for the
third wicket. Majid departed after scoring a composed sixty runs. Wasim Raja
joined Mushtaq and from the word go he started to score runs at a rapid pace.
He forged critical partnerships with Mushtaq and Javed Miandad to boost the
Pakistani scoreboard. Wasim scored a 57-ball 58 with six scorching boundaries as
Pakistan
notched up a fighting total 266 for 7 in 60 overs.
Sarfraz Nawaz rocks the Caribbean top
order
The West Indian chase started in a shaky manner. Pakistani
pacer Nawaz had turned into a demon and rocked the Caribbean
batting line-up with movement and controlled bowling. Greenidge, Fredericks and
Kallicharran were all Sarfraz’s victims and 36 for 3 became 99 for 5 as West
Indies ’ chances of winning the match looked impossible.
Clive Lloyd and Bernard Julien added 46 runs for the sixth
wicket, but Lloyd fell to Miandad’s leg spin and at 203 for 9 it was all over
for West Indies with 16 overs still left.
Roberts and Murray script history
A frustrated looking Deryck Murray was joined by young
paceman Andy Roberts. Both of them were not well-equipped with the bat and Pakistan ’s
victory seemed to be a matter of time. But cricket is a game of glorious
uncertainty and no game is finished until the last ball is bowled.
The Pakistani bowlers, who made the West Indian top, middle
and lower middle-order batsmen to reel, started to find it tough to dismiss
Murray and Roberts. They stayed calm and picked up singles, couples and
boundaries without creating any hassles. In the end, five runs were required
off the last over.
Andy Roberts was on strike. He tried to pull Raja but the
ball hit his pad and they ran two. Two more runs were fetched from the
midwicket region. One run was required and both Murray and Roberts were
determined to run for it no matter where the ball went.
Roberts tapped Raja to midwicket to steal the winning run
and knocked Pakistan
out of the World Cup.
The World Cup had tasted its first ever nail-biting match
and thus, the tournament had gained the much needed momentum.
Note: This article has been published in Sportskeeda on 29/09/2014 http://www.sportskeeda.com/cricket/west-indies-pakistan-1975-first-nail-biting-match-world-cup-history
Thank You
Thank You
Faisal Caesar
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