In the animal kingdom, a young male often proves his worth by taking down a grizzled veteran. It’s the ultimate rite of passage, and can often end in one or both being close to death. There was no blood spilled at the Eden Gardens on Saturday afternoon, but on one of the grandest stages in cricket, Rahmanullah Gurbaz’s domination of Rashid Khan, his illustrious countryman, truly announced his arrival as a special batting talent.
Gurbaz has three international centuries, all in the ODI format. And while no one is dismissing the value of those innings against Ireland, the Netherlands and Bangladesh, they weren’t part of a marquee competition watched by tens of millions every evening. The Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) management had reposed faith in Gurbaz at the start of the 2023 season, and he had shown glimpses of potential while making a 44-ball 57 against Royal Challengers Bangalore.
But after three consecutive failures had taken his numbers for the season to 102 runs from 87 balls, KKR reluctantly pressed pause. With the big-hitting Jason Roy in the squad, there was no necessity to keep playing Gurbaz, who turned 21 last November. And but for Roy getting injured during the recent win in Bangalore, Gurbaz may have spent the rest of the season on the bench.
Roy’s misfortune gave Gurbaz a second bite of the cherry, and he wasn’t about to miss out. It didn’t matter that he was up against Gujarat Titans, the defending champions who have perhaps the best-balanced attack in the competition. Mohammed Shami offers a guarantee of wickets in the Powerplay, Rashid is usually the mid-overs controller, and a revitalised Mohit Sharma has increased Hardik Pandya’s options at the death.
For Gurbaz though, the key clash was undoubtedly with the man who has become an Afghan hero like no other since he made his IPL debut in 2017. Was Gurbaz intimidated or unnerved by the prospect of facing someone who has captained him at international level? It didn’t seem that way. Rashid bowled 11 balls to him. This was how the sequence went – 1, 6, 4, 1, 4, 1, 0, 1, 6, 4, 2. That’s 30 runs from 11 balls, off a bowler whose economy-rate has never gone over 7 in any of the full seasons that he has played.
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Gurbaz faced just two balls in the first three overs. It was a nonchalant pick-up over fine leg off Hardik that got him going, and thereafter, Gujarat found no way to stem the tide of strokes. Shami was slammed for six back over his head, and Rashid greeted with another straight six. Noor Ahmad, his other countryman, also wasn’t spared later in the innings, and his striking down the ground was of pristine quality.
What stood out most, though, was the sheer fearlessness. These weren’t donkey-drop bowlers. They’re some of the league’s elite performers, and while he was out there, Gurbaz made them look like they were glorified net bowlers.
There were echoes there of one of the most important innings in Afghan cricket history. In March 2006, a time when the suggestion that Afghanistan would play in cricket World Cups would have been greeted with peals of laughter, a Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) team led by Mike Gatting played Afghanistan at the Police Gymkhana in Mumbai. A picturesque location with Marine Drive and the Arabian Sea on one side, and the Western Railways suburban tracks on the other, the ground was far too small to contain a certain Mohammad Nabi.
Afghanistan would win by a crushing 171 runs, with Nabi making a dazzling 116. At least three balls were lost on or near the railways tracks as pick-up shots off the pads and pulls cleared the boundary rope by a mile. Afterwards, Gatting would say with a rueful grin on his face that ‘the lad can play’. Soon, Nabi and Hamid Hassan were playing for the MCC, and Afghanistan moved up the divisions in the World Cricket League at meteoric speed.
At a media interaction before the 2015 World Cup in Australia and New Zealand, Shapoor Zadran, Afghanistan’s leading pace bowler at the time, was asked about the fearless attitude. With the help of the team manager who doubled up as translator, Zadran answered. “The golden eagle is one of our national symbols,” he said with a smile. “Why would an eagle fear anything? We will fly.”
When Gurbaz started to soar at the Eden Gardens, some of the best bowlers in the competition, including his national hero, had no answer. You sense this IPL will see a few more such flights.