Bloodbath at Sabina Park
Partab Ramchand - 30 April 2002

It was a pity that the 1976 series between India and the West Indies in the Caribbean ended on a bitterly acrimonious note, for there was much good cricket in the three Tests prior to the final game that caused all the controversy and heartburn. Indeed, that final Test at Kingston has come to occupy a niche in cricket history ­ but for all the wrong reasons.

Lloyd, by then, had unleashed a bumper and beamer barrage, with Holding and Daniel freely indulging in short- pitched intimidatory bowling that went unchecked by the umpires. The result was that Gaekwad, Viswanath and Patel suffered injuries, and they had to be taken to hospital.

The excellent cricket of the first three Tests was in fact a tribute to the staying power of the players, since both teams must have been tired even as the series started. The West Indies had just finished an arduous tour of Australia, and losing the six-match contest 5-1 could not have done much for their morale. The Indians, for their part, flew into the West Indies directly from New Zealand, where they had, rather disappointingly, shared the three-match rubber 1-1.

And yet, putting aside their mental and physical exhaustion, India and the West Indies indulged in a cut-and-thrust contest so that, at the end of three Tests, the result sheet read: West Indies 1, India 1, drawn 1. There could not have been a better scenario going into the decider, but what transpired at Sabina Park was not exactly cricket.

As the series started, most would have tagged the West Indies as favourites. The rebuilding process under Garry Sobers and Rohan Kanhai was over, and under Clive Lloyd, the nucleus of a formidable side was emerging. They had supreme stroke-players supreme like Vivian Richards - then in the midst of the greatest phase of his career during which he set the record of 1710 runs in a calendar year - Laurence Rowe, Roy Fredericks and Alvin Kallicharran, besides Lloyd himself. In Andy Roberts and Michael Holding, they had a fearsome pace duo.

To combat this, India had Sunil Gavaskar, Mohinder Amarnath, Gundappa Viswanath, Brijesh Patel, Surinder Amarnath and Anshuman Gaekwad to shoulder the batting, while the bowling would revolve around the spin quartet, then at their peak. Of course, with some luck Mohinder Amarnath and Madan Lal could be expected to make the initial breakthroughs to take some burden off the spinners’ shoulders.

Yet, when the West Indies won the first Test by an innings and 97 runs in three days at their favourite venue, Bridgetown, the stage seemed set for a one-sided result. Within a fortnight, however, a transformed Indian side had the West Indies by the scruff of their neck in the second Test at Port of Spain - only to let them wriggle out through dropped catches.

But then the Indians had a stroke of good fortune. The third Test was scheduled to be played at Georgetown, but due to incessant rain at Guyana, the match was shifted to Port of Spain. The Queen’s Park Oval has been India’s luckiest venue abroad, and they proceeded to prove this beyond doubt by registering one of the most remarkable victories in Test cricket.

Set a target of 403 for victory in a little over nine hours, India reached their forbidding goal with seven of the last 20 mandatory overs to spare. Their final total of 406 for four remains, over 800 Test matches later, the highest in the fourth innings to win a Test match.

Planning their objective "with the perfection of a cricketing Lester Piggott," as Tony Cozier wrote, India had Gavaskar (102) and Viswanath (112) playing the strokes, while Mohinder Amarnath (85 in 442 minutes) remained the perfect anchor-man. Patel (49 not out) applied the finishing touches to herald a glorious triumph.

But the victory had some vicious, even scary, repercussions. Lloyd came in for severe criticism, and he was under intense pressure to win the final Test. It was his declaration that had paved the way for the Indian triumph and, even earlier, the humiliating loss in Australia had not gone down too well with the West Indian cricket authorities, the press and the cricket fans. For the final Test, therefore, he packed the side with a pace quartet in Holding, Wayne Daniel, Bernard Julien and Vanburn Holder, won the toss, and put India in to bat on a freshly laid pitch.

With batting that was the apotheosis of courage, Gavaskar, Anshuman Gaekwad and Mohinder Amarnath saw India past the 200-run mark for the loss of only one wicket. Lloyd, by then, had unleashed a bumper and beamer barrage, with Holding and Daniel freely indulging in short-pitched intimidatory bowling that went unchecked by the umpires. The result was that Gaekwad, Viswanath and Patel suffered injuries, and they had to be taken to hospital.

Bishan Singh Bedi declared the innings closed at 306 for six in an effort to protect his bowlers from the brutal and unfair attack. The West Indies then took a first-innings lead of 85, but this assumed alarming proportions as the Indian injury list grew. Bedi and Bhagwat Chandrasekhar sustained hand injuries while fielding and were thus not in a position to bat.

With Gaekwad, Patel and Viswanath still out of action, India were reduced to six batsmen, and the innings terminated at 97. Indeed, all 17 members of the touring squad fielded at some stage during the match, and Surinder Amarnath, who fielded as substitute for much of the first innings, was operated on for appendicitis on the fourth day. The West Indies won the match, scheduled for six days, by 10 wickets with two days to spare.

Midway through the match, Bedi and manager Polly Umrigar held a press conference at which they formally protested against the intimidatory tactics of the West Indian pacemen. They made it clear that, in their view, the tactics were unfair and unwarranted, going against the spirit of the game. Lloyd, quite predictably, retorted by asking whether the Indians expected half-volleys. Manager Clyde Walcott asked the Indians to learn to play fast bowling instead of cribbing.

Gavaskar, who was the vice-captain, later made some harsh comments about Lloyd, Walcott and the West Indian tactics, also describing the Jamaican crowd as "a mob of blood-thirsty barbarians."

The controversial and unseemly end put into shade some fine cricket played during the series, chiefly seen in the batting of Richards, who got hundreds in each of the first three Tests, and Gavaskar, who got his customary centuries in the two Port of Spain Tests. There were also three-figure knocks to savour from the blades of Patel, Viswanath, Lloyd and Kallicharran. There was some excellent bowling too from Bedi and Chandrasekhar, who picked up 18 and 21 wickets respectively.

However much the cricket thrilled, though, the series will be mainly remembered for the bloodbath at Sabina Park and that is very unfortunate indeed.

© CricInfo

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