It is not enough to describe India’s game against Pakistan as the biggest of the group stage of this World Cup – it is so much more than just a cricket match. And there is a symbolism to it being played at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad, just a couple of hours’ drive from Modi’s birthplace of Vadnagar and in his home state of Gujarat, a hotbed of support for his ruling Bharatiya Janata party. Under Modi, relations with Pakistan have become so strained that almost no visas have been granted to Pakistani fans or journalists to come to this tournament.
In World Cups, India’s record against Pakistan is absolutely superb – they have played them seven times and won on every occasion – and in my opinion that has been simply because they have handled the occasion of these huge matches better, and managed to control their emotions. Pakistan have beaten them plenty of times in other competitions, and memorably thrashed them at the Oval in the Champions Trophy final in 2017, but in the biggest tournament of all they seem to freeze.
Back in 1996, I was in India when they played Pakistan in Bengaluru, in what proved a classic match. India batted first, scoring 287, and Pakistan rattled along in reply, reaching 113 for one and looking well set. Then their captain, Aamer Sohail, who had already scored a half-century, lost control of his emotions and got involved in a spat with Venkatesh Prasad, one of India’s pace bowlers – next ball he was out, and that changed the whole complexion of the game.
For the 2011 World Cup, co-hosts India were coached by Gary Kirsten, and he brought in the South African sports psychologist Paddy Upton as their mental conditioning and strategic leadership coach. He went on to write a fascinating book, The Barefoot Coach, which covered the work he did with the team. It detailed his work to get them to be mentally at ease with the pressure of being favourites for a huge tournament at home, dealing with that huge adulation and expectation, and embracing the phrase that Ben Stokes likes to use about his Test side: running towards the danger.
It probably helped that they were led by MS Dhoni, the Iceman, who ran things in his own way, with such calmness, charisma and confidence. Sometimes players can feed off that. In Rohit Sharma, the current India side has a captain with many of those qualities, probably better suited to take on the role in this tournament than Virat Kohli, his predecessor, who has many excellent qualities and demands energy and absolute commitment from his players, but can also be a bit more emotional. If things aren’t going their way you can rely on Sharma to remain calm, leading by example to stop his players becoming fraught.
Clearly it is not impossible for a team to deal with the pressures or being hosts and favourites: England, after all, managed it in 2019. In the first couple of years under Eoin Morgan they always seemed to underplay their success, even as they rose to the top of the rankings. But about 18 months out from the tournament the language changed, confidence continued to grow through regular good performances and in the end they embraced the tag of favourites without scaling back on their aggressive approach. This was right out of the Upton playbook, running towards the danger.
India’s players are used to performing in front of big crowds, in these huge cauldrons of noise. For Pakistan’s players the conditions will be a bit more foreign and that might be a disadvantage, particularly with such a large crowd crammed into the world’s biggest cricket ground. That will have been discussed at length in the Pakistan changing room over recent days: dealing with the noise, and finding ways of turning it down a few notches. Just like away teams in the Premier League often try just to consolidate in the first 15 minutes of a game to calm all the home fans in the stands, Pakistan will have spoken about the importance of starting well. For their bowlers it will be executing skills, minimising scoring chances in the opening powerplay; for their batters it might be trying to be solid rather than explosive at the start.
The biggest crowd I played in front of was the Boxing Day Test at the MCG, crammed with 80,000 people. I used to field at cover point, so not on the boundary, but there was a huge number of people and if there was a boundary scored or a wicket taken the noise was immense. As a player of course you are aware of it, but you should be fully engaged in what you’re meant to be doing for the team and it should fade into the background.
The great performers – players such as Kevin Pietersen, Ben Stokes, going back to Viv Richards in those early World Cup finals – feed off the crowd. Their performances seem to rise in line with the size of the occasion – they have an extrovert nature that allows them to plug in to the energy.
In a packed MCG at last year’s T20 World Cup, both sides rose to the occasion and created a thrilling match played in good spirit, but the fact that this one is in India, and in Gujarat, means it is different. The day after I watched that match in 1996 I picked up a local paper, which reported the devastation in Pakistan at the loss. They wrote about one guy who – when the result was confirmed – picked up his gun, shot his television and then shot himself. That is the gravity of this game, which is heavy with the historical context of these two countries, how they were created and the wars they have fought.
I suspect India will make it 8-0 on Saturday, given that for all Pakistan’s quality the hosts have the better batting lineup, the better group of spinners, and in Jasprit Bumrah an X-factor bowler who is quick, accurate and has great variations. But this game will not just be about the players’ skill, but also their spirit.
