Ravi Shastri is not exactly an emotional man but even the hard nosed Mumbaikar in him couldn’t help but become nostalgic as he entered the Basin Reserve ground where India will play a Test against New Zealand from Friday.
And why not? Friday, the 21st does hold a very special place in the India coach’s heart. Exactly 39 summers back, a wide-eyed 19-year-old teenager Shastri became India’s ‘Test Cap No. 151’ at the Basin Reserve on a cold windy day when the gangly six-footer had to wear three old fashioned cable knit sweaters.
“It was 39 years. They say what goes around comes around. Tomorrow, same day, same ground, same team, same city I made my Test match debut 39 years ago. Unreal,” Shastri tweeted as he stood there looking at the wooden benches and white grilled picket fence that have survived the test of time.
“The dressing room is still the same. No change,” the head coach was seen telling people.
Incidentally, in 1981, Shastri was flown to New Zealand after Dilip Doshi had got injured during the tour of Australia.
The 19 year-old was playing a Ranji Trophy quarter-final match in Kanpur and, according to a newspaper report, Shastri got the news of his maiden national call-up from the gate-keeper of the guest house where the Mumbai team was put up.
For someone, whose experience of playing fast bowling at the domestic level was confined to the military medium pace of Madan Lal, a gritty 19 coming in at No.10 wasn’t all that bad.
But it was his left-arm spin that impressed one and all on a seaming track as he ended with figures of 3/54 and 3/9. India, however, lost that Test by 62 runs.