Sliding Down

JUNE 1999 - What we are silently witnessing in Pakistan is disgraceful and that’s putting it mildly. Ever since the Pakistan team capsized in what is now an established and typical fashion at Lords, the blood hounds have been baying non-stop. Nothing less than tearing the team from limb to limb and drinking their tainted blood will satiate the hounds. And perhaps even that will not be enough. Bumping the whole squad off in a ‘pullsc muqabala’ is being stronmly recommended. Ecept for the odd voice of reason raised by Omar Kureshi (who wrote a day before the Cup final and later again) and earlier this week, by Nur Khan, the nation led by the country’s legendary Urdu yellow press duly supported by the English language papers have joined the happy witch hunt. The pictures of the frightened team members huddled like common criminals should put this nation and its preachers to shame; on the contrary it seems to have merely refuelled the fires of hate and vengeance.

What happened at Lords was a spineless, inept and miserable performance. Any cricket supporter would have had an epileptic fit watching the team come apart on a perfect batting wicket, a glorious summer day, at the ultimate dream venue, watched by millions across the world. A local club side would have fared better. What was on display at Lords was a team which had lost the final even before it began. There was a tension, an anxiety and a panic-look the two openers wore in addition to their gear. As the day turned into a horror, the players floated about like they were stoned – zombies with glassy eyes. This was no top-notch, crack, high-performance unit. This was a rag-tag assembly of stars without lustre. Every Pakistani who had supported the team, with prayers, exhortations, will power and blind faith must have felt the elation and anticipation slip away within half an hour of the start.

But is that all ? In all fairness to the fans, it is not the defeat as much as the manner in which it happened. The truth is that this team was lucky to get as far as it did. Most cricket fans in this country given the hysteria the game whips up, will disagree, but our performances swung from the sublime to the ridiculous. As is the norm with us, we were brilliantly erratic – soaring to heights and plummeting into the gutters. No one could predict what we would produce in the next half hour. Sides like Bangla Desh toppled us. Even Scotland looked formidable for a while. The Kiwis loomed like giants till we trampled them, but the team’s performance elsewhere was always loaded with doubt, uncertainty and tentativeness. We would invariable collapse, revive in the middle, hit our way out of trouble towards the end and somehow notch up a victory – but not without hiccups. This has been our trademark for years.

The great victory of 1992 was a freak win. We all know how we made it to the final and in doing so causing the fans enough tension to last them a lifetime. We have crashed to inexplicable defeats, looked like novices and in all this, produced stunning performances. And that’s the way we have always been. We have never had the ruthlessness of the Australians, the discipline of the South Africans or the flamboyance of the Lankans. We have had all these in bits and pieces every now and then, but consistency is not one of our virtues and an impartial and honest look at our track record will prove that.

Whatever the failings of the team and its management, howsoever badly they lost the final and whatever the betting slur that they carry, there is no justification for the public outrage now on shameless display for the world to see and laugh at. The bitter truth is we are incapable of taking any defeat and it is not only in cricket. We are the biggest moaners and groaners. There is no shortage of conspiracy theories we’ll cook up to justify what often is our own stupidity and ineptness. We cannot take criticism. The whole world is constantly plotting against us. If it’s not the Israeli high command, it’s David Shepherd.

We all have a lot of growing up to do and we should start somewhere. Stoning Inzi’s house in Multan is not the answer. It never was and never will be. We have to reflect on our shortcomings – there’s a long list here. As we slide down inexorably in every field, our ability to distinguish black from white is constantly eroding. We have been wiped out of hockey and squash, our policies at every level are disastrous failures and our financial position is hopeless and terminal. Our institutions are sinking without trace and our value-systems are all but gone. We are zilch on performance and big on hype, yet we are perfect, beyond reproach and wonderfully gifted.

During all this, I was hoping (against hope of course) that the PM, the great cricket lover that he is, would have risen to the occasion and told everybody to calm down and cool it. Instead there has been deafening silence from Islamabad and Bagh-e-Jinnah where he scores every Saturday (oddly only in fours. I think he should have been the first one to have taken the team to task for a poor performance but then gone on to praise them for having made it to the finals. His silence has only convinced the yahoos that the witch-hunt , Ehtesab Bureau and all, has official support from the powers that be.

This could be worse than losing the final.