In the annals of cricketing history, the Ashes has a special place, and so do games involving India and Pakistan but over the last two decades, another rivalry has acquired a halo that rivals the very best of face-offs. India against Australia isn’t for the faint-hearted, the signs of which were evident even during that famous tied Test at Madras (Chennai now) in 1986.
Cut to a present with roots harking back to V.V.S. Laxman, Rahul Dravid and Harbhajan Singh, and their magic at the Eden Gardens in 2001, nothing has changed. India and Australia continue to dish out engrossing fare and the high-point perhaps was the tour Down Under during the 2020-21 season. India was the walking-wounded, Virat Kohli flew back home to embrace parenthood, a 36 total was mustered too and trailing 0-1, disaster loomed ahead.
Yet, under Ajinkya Rahane and with a squad that moved from the second string to perhaps the third unit as personnel kept changing, India roared back to claim the series at 2-1. This story, soaked in the never-say-die spirit while the COVID-19 pandemic lingered, had to be told and who better than Bharat Sundaresan, that boisterous presence in cricketing press boxes, and perhaps his Watson, Gaurav Joshi, to do the honours?
Beyond the pitch
Bharat and Joshi’s The Miracle Makers is a remarkable book and much like Rahul Bhattacharya’s Pundits from Pakistan, it is a narrative that goes beyond what transpired on the turf. Sport isn’t entirely about what you see on television screens, and Bharat, with Joshi lending him a hand, draws those diverse threads that blend athletes, results, debates and travel within the sporting realm.
Bharat, whose bibliography includes tomes on M.S. Dhoni and Suresh Raina, is good with tapping the person behind the sporting facade. His latest book has these stunning pen-portraits of coach Ravi Shastri, Rahane, Rishabh Pant and many others which tumble out of the pages while his one eye stays on the way the series panned out. “Every time this relentless Indian team felt like a door had been shut on them, another opened and out walked a hero,” Bharat writes.
This book also offers a peep into what sports writers do, the constant travel, the quest for insights, the self-deprecatory humour and equally does a hat-tip to Indian cricket as well as Australia’s warmth, which Bharat, based in Adelaide, and Joshi, a quintessential Sydneysider, would vouch for.
The Miracle Makers; Bharat Sundaresan with Gaurav Joshi; Penguin Random House, ₹399.
