Cricket is a game of grit, passion and determination. The players had to toil hard to score every runs and the oppositions had to toil hard to prevent every run. But when a player gets injured, naturally most of the players likes to safe side themselves and doesn’t comes back to the pitch before being deemed ready. But due to the passion and determination for the game, some players came back to field even after serious injuries for the sake of the team. Below are the instances where players showed immense grit to comeback to the pitch after being seriously injured.
1.Rick McCosker (Australia, 1977) – In the test against England, the Aussies won the toss and decided to bat first. McCosker was one of the batsmen of the opening pair. After McCosker saw the fall of Ian Davis wicket, in order to counter-attack McCosker made a mistake of playing a hook on a moisture pitch where the bounce was too much. Hapless timing and wrong judgement together saw the ball missing his bat and directly hit his jaw. To add to his wound, the ball also dislodged the bails but the scenario’s main focus was Rick, as he was bleeding badly. An X-Ray report made the effectiveness of the injury clear, as it showed jaw is fractured on 2 places. Meanwhile, the Aussies got bundled out for a paltry 138 as they couldn’t stand the early collapse. But they came back roaring while their time came in bowling as they managed to get an impressive 43 runs lead. In the second inning, however the Aussies started off well and built the inning accordingly. But given England’s batting depth, the Aussies were well aware that every run mattered.With the score of 353-8, an injured Rick McCosker joined the invincible Rodney Marsh in the crease. Matching his expectations, English captain asked his bowlers to bowl relentless bouncers. But McCosker showed immense grit and somehow managed to avoid his jaw from killer bouncers and contributed an invaluable 25. Declaring at 419-9, while defending, the Aussies realized how important McCosker’s inning was. Lead by Derek Rendall’s 174, England were at 346-5 at one position. But the brilliance of Dennis Lillee saw Aussies wreaking havoc on English’s tailenders. It would probably be written that Dennis’s brilliance saw Aussies snatch the win, but somewhere the grit of the person with broken jaw was also invaluable.
2.Malcolm Marshall (West Indies) – Probably the most feared bowler of 1980s, Marshall’s West Indies faced England in Headingley. But on the very first day of the test, Marshall ended up fracturing his thumb in two places. The English batsmen exploited most of the chances provided to them by putting up a decent score of 270. In the inning of West Indies, when Michael Holding got dismissed, Larry Gomes was N.O on 96, when by surprising everyone, Marshall came to bat with literally one hand to partner Gomes. English fielders were laughing at the extraordinary grit of Marshall, probably because it was too big surprise for them. But their laugh was short lived as in the second inning, Marshall rampaged through English batting and took 7 wickets by giving away mere 53 runs.The Carribeans eventually went on to win the game by 8 wickets, Thanks to Marshall’s grit, determination and passion.
3.Arjun Ranatunga (Sri Lanka) – In the Rawalpindi test in 2000, Arjun Ranatunga ensured a victory to Sri Lanka with a broken thumb. In the final inning of the test, Sri Lanka were required to score 220 runs to emerge victorious. The actual drama started when Sri Lanka were crawling towards the target with Jayawardene and Ranatunga. But Yousaf Youhana took the scalp of Jayawardene and in the very next over Ranatunga was hit hard by a rising delivery of Waqar Younis. Panic started when Chaminda Vaas lost his wicket in a running mix up, Nuwan Zoysa got caught in slips and Pramodya Wicremasinghe’s stump was uprooted. With score 177-8, Ranatunga was forced to return with Sri Lanka still needing 43. He and wicketkeeper Romesh Kaluwitharana ensured that the target gets chased down without another mishap to ensure the end that was predicted during the start of the inning.
4.Sourav Ganguly (India) – In the match against Sri Lanka, after Sri Lanka put up a decent score of 259, Ganguly and Sehwag started off the Indian inning. But the very third delivery of the innings saw the ball missing the bat completely and hitting Ganguly on his ribs nastily. Though Ganguly faced one more delivery, he eventually collapsed on the ground as a result of which he was taken off and Robin Utthappa took his place. After the fall of 2nd wicket at 110, to people’s surprise Ganguly came to the crease. Shortly after that Sehwag got himself in trouble due to hesitation while running. Then Ganguly, joined by Yuvraj stitched a 145 runs partnership where Ganguly was playing the second fiddle role to Yuvraj was enough to take India home.
5.Kedar Jadhav (India) – In the final of Asia cup 2018, Bangladesh after a great start, ended up on a score of 222. India didn’t got off to a start they wanted, as they lost Dhawan and Rayudu on a quick succession. Though Rohit Sharma and Karthik tried to steady the chase, Rohit fell off on a delivery of Rubel Hossain. With Dhoni joining Karthik, it was another futile try of steadying the inning as DK was trapped LBW. Setback got materialized when the wicket of Dhoni fell at 160-5, and Jadhav was joined by Jadeja. Jadhav was already hobbling from before after pulling his hamstring and was taken off. But a watchful Jadeja and Bhuvi stitched a decent partnership of 55 runs and took India to a closing distance before Jadeja got dismissed. Followed him was Bhuvi’s wicket, which made Indian fans sweat of nervousness. Then it was Jadhav who came back to join Kuldeep with 9 still required from 11 deliveries. Jadhav and Kuldeep managed to take care of that over with 6 remaining from the final over. The tale was 6 required with Kuldeep on strike and Jadhav was in no situation to run. Jadhav after realizing that he couldn’t smack big, did what we didn’t imagine. He started taking singles in the final over which ultimately minimized the equation to 1 off the final delivery. With all the fielders inside the circle, Jadhav lurched himself for the final delivery. Missing his bat, the ball glanced his pads and rolled down to the boundary the provide India a thrilling victory in the Asia Cup final.
