The Hindu : Sport / Cricket : Kaif — a committed foot soldier

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Sunday, Oct 17, 2004

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Sport - Cricket

Kaif — a committed foot soldier

By S. Dinakar

Mohd. Kaif being run out after a gritty half-century. - Photo: V.V. Krishnan

CHENNAI, OCT. 16. Being Mohammed Kaif, he simply had to fling himself back. He might have set out for a run, the presence of a runner momentarily slipping out of his thoughts, and then gone down in a heap after reverse-sweeping Shane Warne. Still, withstanding the excruciating pain, he had to turn around and go sliding along the ground in a heroic bid to defeat the throw from third man.

With Kaif, you would expect nothing else — no tame surrender for sure. Even if he was sick, limping and exhausted. On another day, he would have nailed the race to the crease, but this was an afternoon, when he was dehydrated and cramping, the uncompromising Chennai weather adding to a viral fever he had caught in Bangalore.

Kaif, after Adam Gilchirst removed the bails, lay on the ground, in absolute agony, before being helped off the arena. Even as he walked back, the character of the man came through forcefully at the Chidambaram Stadium on Saturday. Soon he was transported to a local hospital, where he was administered fluids.

Instinct for survival

Said Kaif in the evening about his dismissal, "I did not know what was happening. I was not able to concentrate." His mind might have been in a daze, but his instinct for survival was very much visible.

The heart of the matter is you got to have the heart for the battle. Kaif has this commodity in plenty, whether he is chasing down a ball or launching himself into a desperate dive as if his life depended on it.

The man whose probing eyes appear even more incisive as they look out of a gaunt visage, had soldiered along bravely till lunch on the third day of the second Test, often sinking to his knees, clutching his thigh, shuffling about in discomfort, but putting a price on his wicket, first holding firm with Parthiv Patel and then Anil Kumble, before being forced by his condition to extend his stay in the dressing room. He dragged himself back into the arena again, after Harbhajan Singh's departure, and soon arrived his dramatic run-out.

Kaif's Test career appears to be up and running again though. The 23-year-old Allahabad cricketer's comeback innings - he was returning to the Indian Test side following a three-year hiatus - was by no means without flaw. He began tentatively, was reprieved early, and there were periods of discomfort during his effort. There were also phases when his willow appeared broad as he covered the swing around the off-stump from the pacemen, and batted with a touch of assurance.

Kaif's 157-ball 64, his first half-century in Tests, was worth more in the context of the match and the situation. The Aussies were regrouping after Virender Sehwag's aggression, when he rallied with a lower order that packed a sting - India hauled itself up from 233 for six.

Forgettable past

His previous experience in Tests is an eminently forgettable one — just 141 runs in four matches at 20.14. It was in the Bangalore Test of 1999-2000 against the Proteas that the wristy Kaif won his Test cap. And after scores of 12 and 23, he found himself in the cold, dumped rather hastily.

It would not be until the campaign in Sri Lanka in 2001 — the Indian team was rocked by injuries — that Kaif would be drafted back into the Test squad. He was stroking the ball well too in the first Test at the lovely Galle ground, flanked by the Indian Ocean and the imposing Galle fort, when the right-hander was consumed by a Dilhara Fernando off-cutter for 37 — his highest Test score till Saturday's knock.

Kaif, undone by Muttiah Muralitharan's off-spin, lost momentum as the series progressed. It would be in another role — as the quintessential ODI cricketer, who could field like a dream, sprint between wickets, and work the ball around — that he made his presence felt in Indian cricket.

When he earned a promotion in the order during the NatWest series against England this year, he justified the elevation, and as he said on Saturday, Kaif has carried that confidence and form into Test cricket.

His Saturday effort here might not have been on the scale of Dean Jones' epic 210 in the immortal tied Test of 1986 at Chepauk, when the Aussie overcame dehydration and cramps. But then, Kaif is no magnum opus. He is a foot soldier, and a committed one at that.

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