Mission Domination: A view from the perimeter of the rejuvenating Indian Test cricket team | Lifestyle News

New Delhi: It really wasn’t a good day for Indian cricket on the 2020-21 tour in Australia. No one could comprehend what had happened to them after the team had folded 36 in their second turn on December 19, the third day of Adelaide’s first test, when the hosts rushed home to win eight wickets.

Something changed exactly after a month. If Adelaide was a nightmare, Brisbane was surreal on January 19th.

Score 328 India rose to 329/7 on the fifth day of the fourth and final test to claim a 2-1 set. (India had won the second test and the third was a draw.)

A lot had changed between 36 all out and 329/7. Everyone saw the performances, but what was put into such an effort is not aware of the people.

What was moving around Ravi Shastri and what was that call with his best friend Bharat Arun?

What did R. Sridhar tell Hanuma Vihar when he was trembling back during a tea break in Sydney?

What about Rishabh Pant’s disappointment before the ascent, Rohit Sharman’s despair to be outside, the sand of Shardul Thakur, or the politics that Navdeep Saini faced in his years of development?

Why was Shubman Gill always meant to play cricket?

How did R. Ashwin turn the corner for one of his finest seasons?

What are the tragedies and difficult times that made Cheteshwar Pujara who he is today?

Every moment has a story and a story that all started for this team.

Boria Majumdar and Kushan Sarkar follow a journey in Mission Domination: An Unfinished Quest (Simon & Schuster) and bring back the story of their lives of flesh and blood. Carefully researched, it’s a perimeter view of the creation of a new Indian men’s cricket team, and it gives readers a behind-the-scenes glimpse into the mindset of players, both young and game legends like Virat Kohli, Ashwin and Rohit.

Boria Majumdar is a sports historian and author and holds a PhD in Social History of Indian Cricket from the University of Oxford. His last work, Simon and Schuster, “Eleven Gods and a Billion Indians,” was awarded to Rabindra Puraskar in 2018. He is also the author of “Playing it My Way” in Sachin Tendulkar’s autobiography.

Kushan Sarkar is PTI’s special correspondent. He has heard several ICC events as a journalist, including World Cup games in Australia, England, New Zealand, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh. He has written extensively on both cricket as a sport and related politics. He has also worked for the Times of India, The Telegraph and Asian Age during his career for seventeen years.