Kamal Ghorui
1996: March was the worst of times. On March 13, the World Cup semi-final match was awarded to Sri Lanka by match referee Clive Lloyd after India’s dramatic collapse in front of a rioting crowd.
2001: March was the best of times. India would now dominate cricket — in all forms.
In 44 BC, a soothsayer had said: Beware the Ides of March! Ides of March refers to March 15 on the Roman calendar. In the play — The Tragedy of Julius Caesar (Act 1, Scene 2) — the soothsayer warns Julius Caesar to avoid the Senate on March 15, predicting a danger.
The importance of March 15 in Indian cricket on the day Caesar was assassinated is huge. But what has the Roman Emperor and Shakespeare’s tragic hero got to do with Indian cricket? In fact, after March 15, Indian cricket changed for the better just as Rome changed for the worse. After conquering the world: Steve Waugh & Co fell in Kolkata and then in Chennai during the India-Australia Test series 2001.
A leading daily mentioned the ‘Ides of March’ after the outcome of the India-Australia series, reminiscent of how the soothsayer had warned Caesar, someone in the Australian dressing room having talked in a hushed tone: “Beware the Ides of March.”
While after Caesar’s assassination, Rome plunged into a civil war and ceased to become a republic, Indian cricket changed forever. It became truly democratic too. You perform, you become a star.
India had lost the Mumbai Test inside three days. Sachin Tendulkar scored a half-century in each innings (60s). Glenn McGrath single-handedly destroyed them and was looking ominous for the series.
Former Editor-in-Chief of The Asian Age MJ Akbar wrote a frontpage piece from Mumbai after the loss: “Time has come to pay (cricketers) by performance. Tendulkar can conquer the world, “but alone asking for the moon”. Truth be told: Rahul Dravid, besides VVS, took it very personally. For the next few years, he was not only a Wall, rather a Samson, unless his locks were cut by Greig Chappell.
The second Test was played at Eden Gardens from 11–15 March. India won the match by 171 runs, courtesy of a disturbing piece of batting from VVS (281) and The Wall (180).
The rest is (Indian cricket) history. How Rome changed after March 15 in 44 BC and how Indian cricket changed after the Ides of March in the new millennium.
While India had tasted blood after Sunil Gavaskar’s debut series in West India (774 runs; average: 154.80; centuries: four, including a double century) in 1971, Kapil Dev had joined the ranks of great ODI captains such as Clive Llyod in 1983 even as India were brought to earth in the Test series against the WI by the former world champions soon after. The tourists crushed India 3-0. Barring Gavaskar, there was little to celebrate in the 1983-4 Test series (save Kapil’s 9/83), Malcolm Marshall was so rampant and in such a devastating form.
But the 2001 win changed all: India started winning matches, series, tournaments, ICC trophies, No. 1 Test team status and started beating Australia in Australia. ‘Perform or perish’ became the buzzword after 2001.
The era of ‘self-belief’
According to commentator Tony Greig, this was only the third time after over 1,500 Test matches that a team had won a Test after following on. This was the same man, whose famous commentary five years ago — at the same venue (Eden Gardens, Kolkata) in a WC semi-final — would haunt India: “Indian batsmen/players are committing suicides”.
One would marvel how things change in five years. Sachin Tendulkar had given his life through the tournament, but it was simply not India’s day in 1996.
In 1999, McGrath dumped India out of the WC.
Cut to 2001 March: India had celebrated like never before having bounced back after the match-fixing controversy.
But Kolkata changed everything. India stopped fearing McGrath and the Aussies even in their den. A couple of years later, India did the unimaginable: they returned from Australia after levelling the series 1-1 (retaining the Border-Gavaskar trophy), courtesy of some fine batting of the Fab Four: Sachin Tendulkar, Sourav Ganguly, Rahul Dravid and VVS Laxman and great performances by bowlers.
On March 14, 2001, India lost no wickets with 357 runs scored on a single day in 387 minutes.
On March 14, 2026 — that is 25 years later — John Wright told Vishal Menon (TOI) in an exclusive interview: “Looking back, I think that victory injected self-belief in the team. It also paved the way for the overseas success that followed.”
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