17 April 2004	Saturday	26 Safar 1425

I am not certain whether the poet is Byron but these lines come to mind: "If Greece must perish we thy Will obey/But let us perish in the face of day." Not for Pakistan the face of day, not even a tame surrender, just the silence of the lambs.

I was hoping that I would be lost for words and would, therefore, be spared the agony of writing about a day, the blackest in Pakistan's cricket history, that has caused so much pain to its supporters. It has nothing to do with the fact that Pakistan lost. Most supporters were reconciled to losing this Test match.

It was too high a mountain but such a lame effort? The Pakistan team broke a lot of hearts and has turned many away from the game itself. And to think that they call themselves professional cricketers!

One doesn't know where to start. Clearly there was no plan on how Pakistan would go about saving the match. It seemed to have been left to the batsmen to devise their own individual strategy, to each his own. What they had in common was an aversion to stay at the wicket and even the fact that the Indians kept dropping catches, almost as if they wanted to earn their win, not be gifted it, was scorned.

Pakistan's batsmen were determined to do it their way. Which was to compete against one another on who was the more irresponsible. The Test match and the series was lost within minutes of the day's play beginning, from the nonchalance of the batsmen who were not out overnight.

They showed the same cluelessness that they had shown in the first innings against the swinging ball. Nothing had been learnt and, therefore, there was nothing to forget. It seems pointless to go down the order and describe how each one got out.

It was spineless batting except in the case of Asim Kamal who stuck it out bravely, a batsman who needed a pain-killing injection administered on the field by the team's doctor, but who kept going. Crudely put, he showed guts.

I was surprised to see Shoaib Akhtar come in to bat. His wrist injury had been complicated by a back pain which turned out to be a rib injury and we were told that he would be out of cricket for six weeks.

Either he had made a visit to Lourdes for a miracle cure or he had bathed in some sacred waters, for he showed no signs of injury, he glowed with good health at the chipper way he strode to the wicket.

Anil Kumble was on a hat trick and he flung his bat in a mighty heave and top-edged four runs. He struck a few more mighty blows as if honour-bound to entertain the crowd, his version of the band playing on even as the Titanic was sinking.

Television pictures of Inzamamul Haq sitting in the dressing room showed him to be in pain at this robust batting. Or was he simply ashamed by this in-your-face attitude. I have always maintained that every one has to come to terms with himself or herself.

This was a show of flippancy. The irony was that Shoaib was batting with Asim Kamal and one wondered what must have gone through the mind of the young, left-handed batsman. Win or lose, this would have been a memorable tour, memorable for the fact that it took place at all and there were no untoward incidents of any kind.

One would have praised too the quality of cricket we saw but for this last day's play. The Indians played brilliant cricket and deserved to win. They showed commitment and reaped its reward.

Pakistan just threw in the towel. It is for the PCB to find out what went wrong for something went horribly wrong. Pakistan has lost before this and has been outplayed and the margin of defeat has been heftier than an innings and 131 runs.

But it never capitulated in this manner as it did at Rawalpindi. It makes one angry. No one is bigger than the game and no game is bigger than one's country. One feels for Inzamam. To his everlasting credit he was gracious in defeat even as one imagined tears gathering in his heart and which would roll to his eyes in the seclusion of a private moment.