Chapter 34: Chapter 34: Trail selection match
The Thursday morning air at 9:00 AM felt completely different from the last three days. When Nitin and I walked into the Wankhede practice enclosure, the cricket balls weren’t spinning in buckets, and the bowling markers were completely empty. There were no stumps set up in the nets.
Coach Kadam was already standing near the white boundary line, a thick green folder tucked under his arm. He blew his brass whistle twice, the sound cutting through the chatter of the thirty-six boys.
"All of you, stand in a straight line right here," Coach Kadam shouted, pointing his finger toward the grass edge. "Hurry up. The selectors are already in the box."
We lined up in a long row according to our schools. Nitin stood right next to me, his hands resting on his thighs, his uniform still showing faint grease marks from yesterday’s diving drills.
Chief Selector Vasu Paranjape walked over from the pavilion gate. He didn’t have his plastic chair today. He stood right in front of us, his old linen hat pulled low over his spectacles, his arms tucked behind his back.
"The net trials are finished," Vasu sir said, his gravelly voice flat. "For the next two days, you are playing a match. Two innings. Forty-five overs maximum for each team’s first innings. I want to see who can handle a real match situation on a hard turf wicket. Kadam, read the sheets."
Coach Kadam opened his folder, pulling out a white stenciled paper.
"Team A will be captained by Nitin," Kadam announced, looking down the line. "The playing eleven for Team A: Nitin, Kabir Singh, Sunil, Gupte, Kamlesh, Amit, Sanjay as keeper, Devendra, Vinay, and the two regional quicks from Balmohan. You are batting first."
Nitin gave a short nod, his chest moving as he took a deep breath.
"Team B will be captained by Joshi," Kadam continued, reading the second column. "You are fielding first. Your opening bowlers are Kulkarni and Deshmukh. Joshi and Chavan will handle the spin rotation. Go to your huddles."
The line broke up immediately. The Team B boys sprinted toward the far fence to start their leg stretches, while our eleven gathered in a tight ring under the shade of the main stadium wall.
Nitin clapped his batting gloves together. "Listen, the pitch has some green grass on the good-length spot. Kulkarni is going to bowl very fast with the new ball. Kabir, you and Sunil are opening. We need a solid base."
Sunil from Sule Gurukul adjusted his helmet visor, giving a quick grunt. "I’ll take the first ball, Nitin. I know Kulkarni’s release angle."
Before we could lift our kit bags, Coach Kadam walked over to our huddle, his clipboard resting against his hip. He looked straight at my face, his eyes narrowing behind his glasses.
"Kabir, come here," Kadam said, pulling me two steps away from the group.
I stood over my bat handle, looking up at him. "Yes, Sir."
"Your role today is very simple," Kadam said, his voice dropping low. "I don’t want to see a single boundary from your bat for the first ten overs. Do you understand? The ball is brand new and the clay is hard. Your job is to defend every single delivery that hits the stumps, leave everything outside off, and take the shine off the leather. I want you to deaden the bounce with soft hands. Make that ball old and soft for the middle order. If you get out trying to play a shot before the twelfth over, your name is off the selection sheet. Clear?"
I looked down at the flat face of my custom bat, then back at his face. I gave a short, firm nod. "Understood, Sir."
"Go put your pads on," he said, turning around to walk toward the main umpire.
At 9:30 AM, Sunil and I walked out onto the main grass. The stadium stands were completely empty, looking huge and gray all around us. The center pitch was pale white and hard, with three thin blades of green grass sticking up right at the four-yard mark.
Kulkarni was already standing at the pavilion end, turning the bright red SG leather ball in his palms. His face looked completely serious. He had set a suffocating field for my opening turn—three slips standing tight together, a wide gully, and a short-leg crouching right in the dirt on the leg side.
Sunil took guard at the striker’s end, and I stood at the non-striker’s crease, leaning my weight against my bat handle.
Ten overs of pure block. No runs. Just deaden the ball into the clay. Let the system handle the line.
[Tendulkar Sync: 18.0%]
[Akram Sync: 18.0%]
The blue notification text blinked once in my vision before dissolving into the sharp glare of the pitch. The mechanical balance of Sachin’s stance settled right into my knees, keeping my feet steady on the white soil.
Kulkarni ran in for the opening over. His heavy boots thudded hard against the turf as he loaded up side-on and unleashed a fast, back-of-a-length delivery that zipped off the green blades. Sunil pushed forward with a tense bat, the ball catching a safe inside edge into the leg-side grass for a single.
The score moved to 1 for 0. I was at the striker’s end now.
Kulkarni walked back to his mark, his eyes fixed on my small chest. He ran in hard, his arm coming over in a high, quick circle, and fired a fast delivery right on the fourth-stump line.
The speed was real, the ball rushing out of the sightscreen background. I stayed perfectly still on my back heel, trusting the template balance, and lifted my arms high to let the ball pass cleanly into the keeper’s gloves.
Smack.
"Nice leave, chotu!" their first slip shouted, clapping his hands.
The next ball was identical. Kulkarni bowled it in the same spot outside off-stump, and I left it alone again, watching the red leather carry straight to the keeper at chest height. On the fifth delivery, Kulkarni grew annoyed by the leaves and bowled a fuller ball on middle stump, searching for an early LBW.
I stepped forward with a short, disciplined stride. I loosened my grip on the handle at the last millisecond, letting my wrists go completely soft as the flat face of my bat met the ball right under my nose.
Thud.
The ball didn’t fly or travel into the infield gaps. It just deadened right into the white clay at my toes, stopping dead.
Kulkarni ran in and finished the over with another fast delivery outside off-stump that I let pass without moving my arms.
Score: 1 Run / 0 Wickets (1 Over).
Deshmukh took the new ball from the opposite end for the second over. He was shorter, using a whippy wrist release to find a sharp, late outswing off the morning moisture.
Sunil faced him carefully, playing two tight defensive blocks before working a wide ball to the point fielder for a quick single.
Score: 2 for 0. I was back on strike.
Deshmukh ran in, delivering a fast ball on a good length that pitched right on the off-stump line. I lunged forward, keeping my chin perfectly over the ball, and used a soft vertical face to blunt the movement right into the grass.
Thud.
"He’s just going to block everything, Deshmukh!" the IES keeper yelled from behind my shoulder. "Come closer, slips! He won’t run!"
Their short-leg fielder moved in until he was standing just six feet from my bat face. I could hear his breathing through his helmet grill.
On the fifth ball, Deshmukh tried to bowl wider to make me reach for a cover drive. I didn’t move my arms. I stayed low in my stance and let the ball whistle past into the keeper’s webbing. The final ball of the over was a fast delivery aimed at my ribs. I stayed back, tucked my elbows tight against my shirt, and let the ball strike the center of the bat to drop dead into the dirt.
By the end of the fifth over, the match had entered a completely frozen state of pure grind. The IES New English bowlers were steaming in at maximum speed, their shirts soaking with sweat as they tried to force a mistake in front of Vasu Paranjape’s clipboard.
But my end remained a solid wall. I didn’t play a single aggressive stroke. When Kulkarni bowled a short bouncer that flew past my chin, I dropped my head under my shoulder and let it go. When Deshmukh targeted the fourth-stump channel four times in a row, my arms stayed completely still, letting the leather carry through.
Every defensive block was executed with maximum control. Whenever the ball hit the straight face of my bat, my hands went completely loose, absorbing the full impact of their 115 km/h pace so the ball never carried to the close-in fielders.
Thud.
Thud.
"He’s like a machine, re," their short-leg muttered into his glove between overs, wiping his face. "He hasn’t looked at the boundary once."
Sunil managed to scrape two more boundaries through the cover gaps whenever they overpitched to him, but my score stayed stuck. One run. Two runs. Three runs.
By the ninth over, Kulkarni’s pace was starting to drop by a fraction, his shoulders lowering as the morning moisture dried out of the pitch. The red leather ball was starting to look scuffed and dull, the fresh lacquer completely gone from the continuous impact against the flat face of my bat. I had successfully absorbed their entire opening morning burst.
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