Hobbling Skipper...

And the Garbage Eating Boats

    ‘Reading the signs’ within a team, including body-language, is one of the reasons that long-distance coverage via television and prepared interviews will never make up for the real thing. It’s the reason I came here.

    Temba Bavuma hobbled his way through the majority of Afghanistan’s innings, directing the field and calling the changes. Perhaps it was just a blister, or grass-burn. The smallest ailments can be fantastically misleading, sometimes. But it became increasingly clear that it was more serious.

    By the time he came out to bat he was attempting to disguise a limp with every step. Here was a captain, fulfilling dream, that was crumbling by the minute. But you don’t let go of them, do you? Not until the bitter end. You keep going, trudging manfully through the bog of denial.

    Hamstring strains (if not torn) don’t heal in four or five days. It will be glorious if the ‘read’ from afar is wrong, but it looked like Bavuma had been told that his injury was most likely tournament-ending. If that was the case, and his decision was to bat anyway as a swansong, then his opening stand of 64 with Quinton de Kock went a long way to winning the game. It may have been meaningless in tournament terms, but it very much wasn’t to him.

    It’s a challenge not to be disparaging about the venue, never mind disproportionately so. It’s a monster. The Emirate of Dubai building a (admittedly awesome) skyscraper just to be the tallest in the world is, quizzically impressive. Hundreds of thousands of people visit ever year and there’s a billion photos on social media. Several posted by me.

    The Narendra Modi Cricket Stadium, however, can’t claim any means to justify its existence other than vanity. Even if the World Cup final fills its capacity, what then?

    -With my belongings returned and old-fashioned running shoes back on tour, it was time to see whether cushioned insoles were still ‘the thing’ with a run this morning along the banks of the Sabarmati River which has been central to life in the city since its inception.

    In 1997 the banks of the river were vast, sprawling fields of mud through which the millions of river-dwellers would wade in order to oblute, wash clothes and gather water for drinking, all at once. It was a curdling sight.

    Today the banks have been fortified by trillions tons of concrete, for many kilometres on both sides. Weirdly, almost nobody treads these new walkways. There are gates prohibiting entry almost everywhere. It’s almost like the construction work has been for exhibition status only. It required several barriers to be climbed and busy roads to be crossed, but the final run was disturbingly quiet in a city of approximately nine million people.

    The river looks conspicuously cleaner than most others in the country. There are voracious, garbage-eating boats trawling day and night. As always, aall is not always as it seems.

    I love Indian food, no addendums. But the cuisine goodbye to Gujarat was a breakfast of fried eggs on toast – with an addendum of spiced chickpeas. My stay at the Sheraton will be a tour memory for life. Thank you, Sean. My next update will be from the considerably different Bentley’s Hotel in Mumbai tomorrow…