On a highway, a bike ,white tees,white trousers,sport shoes , a rider and the pillion ,a brisk speed of 40 KMPH. Adrenaline rushing through the blood, emotions running to a overdose , head is pondering over a strategy , thousand "things" occupying a few ounce of veins and fleshes and blood called brain !!
Midst of a journey, on a very busy highway nothing we can hear , our voices are shut, heart is pumping more bloods than ever!!
A feeling which is almost palpable, there is zest and Jing , head is fighting with heart over a plausible logic !! There is almost a plebiscite to choose(rather elect) upon (if I say this word is chosen correctly ). We are not able to utter even a word and forget about a talk , and I am not blaming it's because of a very cold December winter morning !!
YESSSS!! This is cricket and we are heading to play the finale !!
45 minutes later, now the highway is not in our sight , we are on the ground and the speakers are on a loud note , the crescendo of the voice of the commentator on a high pitch !!
Time for a toss and we are bowling , we go in a hurdle !!Contradicting strategies between 11 "white-wore" human beings and nothing is getting finalized ,but we have to win , nothing else matters literally !!
Inning is done for the first half and it's 140 in 20 overs !!We start to have the inning break lunch , 2 slices of bread, a boiled egg and a banana !!
Leg guards, hand gloves , "box hiding protectors", a willow are in sight !! Heart starts beating on a high , a very high frequency !!
My head is blank , staring at nothing, absolutely nothing , somehow I am confident riding on a semi-final 50 !!
"THHACKK" - is the sound and the red cricket ball shines and crosses past deep cover biting the grassy ground , I am on cloud 9 , nobody can stop me what-so-ever !! I go on a smooth sailing and middling almost everything that bowled to me , a world seems to be a red cricket ball, a 22 yard grey surface ,a man running towards me with a cricket ball !!! Nothing can stop me , not even me , not that poor ( I am not audacious, I am mere confident ) bowler!! I am on 30 !!! we are 95 for 5 in 15 overs (if i remember correctly ) !!!
And I take my front foot out , clearing my posture , making a room to hit that ball over mid-off , alas !! Stunned , nobody has been so cruel to me , my head is spinning , I am caught , that catcher seems to me as my biggest enemy for that moment !! Have we lost the plot , have we come to the end of the life , have we lost the fight , has the world come to an end ?? !! I start to walk , a walk-back longest in my life , I push myself to walk , my eyes are moist , I can't see anything ,my heart is crying , I am a defeated soldier (Or not really ???!!) .
7th down is in sight , hope is 7th down , 7th down is the saviour , 7th down is the "phenomena " I can hold upto and hang in hope !!Trust my tongue "7th down" seems to me the most beautiful thing in this universe !!
I stop a bit and so does the "7th down", and our thoughts cross ,our emotions merge , our hopes unite !!
Naah..... we have not lost yet !! Its another 46 odd runs in next 30 deliveries !!
Every time "7th down" swings his willow, cuts,drives,defends,pulls my reflex action makes me a doppelganger to him !!
we are 15 runs away and a sharp throw from the extreme end a long-on can stand on the edge and wickets are rooted apart !!
"The most beautiful thing" in the universe is short of his crease , "7th down" perishes ,so does the hope !! 8th,9th and 10th are just the formalities , we are on the losing side of the glory that constituted 40 overs ,20 batters ,10 bowlers, a 22 yards , a red cricket ball !! We are on a journey back home ,a long journey which we never wished to be a part of , on the same highway from where we embarked to write a nice story (or did we able to manage to do this ??). It's almost 15 years and much water has flown under the bridge , those 11 (including me ) flesh and bloods are on different walks of lives .
(Just for the record we went on to play many tournaments thereafter as a team and some we lost and some we won and more importantly life moved on !!)
But the word "7th down" still gives me goosebumps and I go to the solitude and think what would have happened had I not played that shot over the mid off ??
