Sachin’s ODI debut match

I recollect from my childhood memories. My father and uncle used to be glued to the radio sets when India won the world cup in 1983. It was around that time, the game of cricket took the nation by the storm. Ravi shashtri , Kapil dev and Srikanth were our first stars when it came to big hittings in one dayers.
But none of them had guts or audacity to dent the Pakistani confidence and impetus which they had acquired after the last ball sixer of Miandad in the 1986 Australasia cup final.

It was a saturday or a sunday. I was quite a cricket historian for little over 9 year old, even at that time.
“watch out for this new kid ” my father had said to my uncle as Sachin Tendulkar walked up to the crease while India having lost half the side had almost given up the run chase.
It was not an official match , but an exihibition match to please the crowd as the original match was adandoned due to bad light. it was not exactly the debut match for Sachin.
I wouldn’t be wrong if I describe that match as the first T20 in the cricket history.
Paksitan having batted first posted 155 runs which is respectable even for today’s high standards of Twenty20.
He faced his first 3 balls from waism akram , of which he whacked the last one for a boundary.
We all wondered how much this baby faced boy could last as pakistan was truly on top.
The next over was bowled by Mushtaq Ahmad ( i guess he was making debut too) Sachin hit his last two balls for two huge sixed straight back past the bowler. And India was suddenly back in the hunt.
Before even Abdul Qadir could start the next over , even the commentators proudly announced (rather challenged) by saying Mushtaq was a copy of Abdul Qadir , lets see if the kid could hit the master spinner instead.Those days there were no neutral commentators. The TV coverage was bought up from Pakistan’s national network , hence the commentator were biased too.
Sachin hit 3 consecutive sixes of Qadir which silenced all of them . The spectators, the commentators alike.
India rallied on sachin’s heroics and reached to a point were we all thought we might win it from there. We needed 14 runs from the last over. It was bowled by Wasim Akram.
Our whole house almost erupted when the first ball was sent to the fence for four. Sachin completed 50 of 17 balls. An identical feat was achieved by Jaysuriya in 1996 which is still a record for ODIs. it came to the last ball when we needed a sixer to win. Sachin had to do a Miandad, but sadly Wasim Akram was far more wily and experienced than chetan sharma. He bowled a chest high bouncer of which sachin could take only a single. It could have been declared a no ball but it was being played in Pakistan and hence the umpires were biased as well. He remained unbeaten on 53 of 18 balls and India lost by 4 runs.

Leaving the whole nation thrilled by the prospect of a mayhem which was about to come.

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