A Sports correspondent looks back on the triumphant moments in Indian sports in the Eighties
The eighties for Indian sport began in 1982, with the Asian Games in New Delhi. It is seldom that ten years sit comfortably on a decade, in specific areas of human endeavor. The Asiad is a good starting point, because organizationally and performance wise it marked the coming of age. The Games created the infrastructure for sports in the country, gave the administrators confidence, and created a mass awareness, thanks to the introduction of color television. Suddenly, sport was big business.
The one achievement, significant in retrospect, before the Asiad, was the Olympic gold in hockey at Moscow in 1980. That was the only Olympic medal of the decade, even if the gold did not have some of his luster thanks to the boycott organized by the US that year. The Azlam Shah Cup (85), the Perak International (86), the Emirates’ Cup (86) Marshall Cup (88) were tournaments India won, each triumph provoking a debate on the revival of Indian hockey, But the last place at the London World Cup (86) and other lesser disasters ensured that the triumphs would be mere footnotes in the overall thesis.
In team games with a truly international base, it was tennis which provided the surprise of the decade. India beat Australia and entered the final of the Davis Cup before losing to Sweden. In volleyball, India took the broke at the Seoul Asiad.
The other triumphs have come in cricket; not the most widely played sport in the world, but followed with a fanaticism matching that of football supporters in most places where it is played. The World Cup victory in England in 1983 and the success at the world championship of cricket in Australia soon after, put India in a position of preeminence in the one day game. For long it had “not been India’s cup of tea.” In Tests, a comfortable 20 series win in England was easily the highlight, statistically, although the tied Test against Australia in Madras must rate as the best finish.
But, as usual, it was the individuals who kept India’s flag flying in world sport. Prakash Paduakone won the All England badminton title, Michael Ferreira and Geet Sethi the world billiards title, Om Agrawal the world snooker, Yasin Merchant the Asian snooker, Vijay Amritraj and Ramesh Krishnan reached the quarterfinals at Wimbledon, Sunil Gavaskar completed ten thousand runs in Test cricket, Kapil Dev took his 300th wicket of the two most outstanding individual efforts of the decade, P.T, Usha’s fourth place in the 400 metres hurdles at the Los Angeles Olympics equaled India’s best at the Olympics Milkha Singh’s fourth place at the Rome Olympics.
Article extracted from this publication >> December 22, 1989
