In Part 2 of his interview on Home of Heroes on JioCinema, former India captain, Anil Kumble relives and takes us behind the scenes of the moment he famously bowled with a broken jaw in the Antigua Test against the West Indies in 2002.
You touched upon, this is how I function, and I believe that I can win from any situation. And you were, who took that responsibility on as a mainstay of the Indian bowling attack. Did that mentality come right from the beginning, or it came along the way for you?
I think it was always that. I never thought of myself as someone who was making a debut as a youngster. So, he needs to get his two wickets and then be in the next game. I never thought about it. I never thought like that. Never. I always believe that look, I’m playing a game here. I’m playing what I love. This is my bowling, and I think I can get the team through. Irrespective of whether I was playing the first match or the last match. I was there to get wickets and that’s how it was.
I want to ask about the 10 wickets because I’m sure people must’ve asked you so many times over the years, which one did you feel was the toughest one for you to get?
I think Saeed Anwar. He was batting really well. He was I think fifty or sixty-odd and was looking comfortable. The first partnership of Shahid Afridi and Saeed Anwar, they had a wonderful one and got a hundred odd. We changed ends after lunch and got Afridi out. I know he sort of thinks that he didn’t nick it. But I guess no batter thinks that they did. That’s how the game goes. So, got the breakthrough and then things started to happen. But Saeed Anwar was someone who was a brilliant batter. I mean, he had a lot of time. Even on that surface, he was middling the ball and I felt that was a challenge because I kept moving from over the stumps to round the stumps because I was starting to get a bit tired. And I knew that on that surface because it was getting slower and low, I had to beat batters with pace and bounce. The only way was to give it everything and as I started to get sort of tired in my spell, then I came round the stumps because as a leg spinner, one thing is, when you go from over the stumps to round the stumps, then you sort of have to get your body behind the ball. Every ball for it to go the way you want it to. So, I started doing that and then the moment I did that, then I continued to bowl and then came back over the stumps. Then I knew that the body was again coming back, so that’s how I got him out. And it bounced a bit and the short leg, Laxman took the catch. So that probably was the toughest one.
Yeah. And when did you feel that? Okay, there’s a possibility? Seventh wicket?
No, I think at the end of six, it was during the tea break. Yeah. So, I got a bit of a break and then seven happened. Saleem Malik got out of and then eight and nine happened in two deliveries of the fifth and the sixth ball so I knew that, okay, here’s my chance. And Sri (Javagal Srinath) had to bowl that difficult over from the other end. I think it was the most difficult over because you sort of create in your mind you practice all the time to bowl to the stumps. And here you have to bowl wide enough, but not that wide and yeah, he almost got Waqar out, I think Ramesh (Sadagoppan Ramesh) almost took the catch. So, after that the next over I bowled, I knew that I had to get my tenth in that over. Otherwise asking Sri to do it again would be a bit of an embarrassment. So yeah, it happened and Waseem Akram decided that he was going to play the six balls, and won’t give Waqar the strike. I don’t think he played for the turn. Yeah, it’s about just enough in that.
Beautiful. When did it start to sink in?
I think the immediate reaction was - we won the game because the first one was very narrow, lost that by 12 runs in Chennai and this was a two-Test series. So, the first thing was, okay we won the test match and that’s it. And after that just got of course and everyone sort of came and picked me up and carried me off the field. It was something very special.
To think about the fact that you’ve done something that only one bowler before you did in Test cricket and in that moment of achievement you actually looked happy that you won the game rather than say, wow, what have I just done here?
No, I don’t think you sort of go into every game thinking that you’re going to pick wickets every week. I mean, that’s how you sort of plan. It doesn’t happen that way. Yeah, in that sense it happened. Cricket is such a funny game that it brings you back to earth very quickly. Four days later, we were playing the Asian Test Championship at Eden Gardens, Sri got eight in the first innings and I got one. So, I mean, that’s what cricket is. So yeah, it doesn’t give you the cushion that, okay, since you got ten the next game it’s going to be a just bowl and things will happen. Doesn’t work that way.
What would you rate more if you had to choose one between the two, the 100 or 10 wicket haul?
Obviously ten. Because 100 I don’t think anybody expected. I simply had the belief because I had done it at the first-class level and I’d done it at the junior level. It was just a matter of time. But I don’t think I gave it enough. Today, I think you have so many people helping batters. Those days it had to be literally calling out Sachin, Saurav and later on Viru, Yuvi and all these guys to come and bowl. Because they were all tired. I mean, imagine the bowlers asking them to run.
Yeah. So, it was different. You had to just manage with whatever you got and then try and keep yourself ready for any challenge out there. Obviously, 100 was special. But I think 10 was even more special.
For you as being the highest LBW wicket-taker in Test cricket. What was that thing that kind of made you feel like I can trap this batter LBW or was that something that you always kind of went back to?
I think every time I bowled at a new batter - I knew that I would get him because I think whenever a new batter faced me, everyone who spoke about me to the batter said don’t play back to him. So, when someone says, don’t play back to him, you’re invariably going to play on the back foot. So, I knew that I could set him up. But as people started to understand and then play differently, they used the pace. Then it became a bit more difficult for me to then I had to change my pace, angles, develop the googly. Bowled differently. So, it was quite challenging. I think that’s how you sort of grow as a player. And also, you try and develop new variations, a new skill, and that’s what the game teaches you. Every game you have to sort of learn from it and then try and see how you can adapt what you have learned in the next game and next year and so on and so forth. And I think batters too - it’s the same.
You mentioned Saeed Anwar, if you could name two or three of the toughest batsmen you’ve ever bowled to in your career?
Well, I think it was good that most of them were a part of my team. Imagine bowling at Sachin, Rahul, Saurav, Viru, Laxman, all these guys in a match. It would have been a nightmare. Jokes apart had some wonderful batters whom I bowled against. Aravinda de Silva was a tough one and Brian Lara - he probably had three shots to every ball and he would change. You would think that you’ve got him. You’d feel that you’ve deceived it and then suddenly you play a shot, which you can’t imagine and when you know that he’s come forward, you have beaten him, and then he would just use the pace and then late cut for four and that was his quality. I think in every series, you sort of encounter a couple of tough guys who sort of are difficult. Jacques Kallis was someone who never, ever gave away his wicket. Inzi (Inzamam-Ul-Haq) was really tough and then I mean some of the left-handers were really - Hayden was someone who was imposing. We knew that getting him out LBW was out of the equation. So yeah, I think you know in terms of challenging players but you accept it, some days you get the better of them. Some days they get the better of you.
You played with that broken jaw in 2002 where I think it literally is become the living embodiment of what Indian cricket is in the 21st century. And you were going for a win and it was obviously tough to do that and but what spurred you in that moment? What inspired you to go out there and say okay I’m going to do this now?
I think I was the only spinner in the playing eleven. I didn’t play the previous two test matches. I played the first one and then I was dropped for the next two and here I was coming back after the injury. After my shoulder injury, I played one series and then came back. Yeah so, I knew that I had to go and win the game. We had a chance with six hundred-plus runs on the board. Not many times, when you travel overseas you get that opportunity. So, I knew that if I could go there and then perhaps get a couple of wickets and put the team in a good position, we had a chance to win because I knew I was coming back home. I told my wife, Chetna and I called her up. When we spoke, I said, look I know I have to come home because I just need surgery. So, she arranged for all of that in Bangalore and I knew that I was coming back the next day. As I dropped off the call, I just told her that look I’ll go and bowl, but she thought probably I was just joking and I went back to the dressing room.
What did she say when you said that?
I don’t think she even took it seriously. What’s he saying? So, when I went back to the dressing room, I saw Sachin bowling because he was the only guy in the team who could bowl and then Wavell Hinds, I think was playing I don’t remember somebody else was batting. And I thought it was my chance. I have to go and get a couple of wickets. If we can get West Indies three or four down, end of day two or three. I think if you can get them out, then maybe, we have a chance to win the game. That was the only thought. So, I told Andrew Leipus (physiotherapist) - get me out there.
Tell me how many painkillers did you pop that day?
The doctor literally kept my lower jaw together by wiring inside a temporary wiring off from one tooth to the other side’s tooth – that kept it in one place. I don’t know how many painkillers I had. I was on liquids. Even the liquids were not easy and in West Indies, there is no vegetarian. It was just the soup. No protein shakes.