 Eddie Aibara’s Ranji final
The first time Hyderabad won the Ranji Trophy was in the 1937-38 season, when a fortuitous conspiracy of circumstances brought the state into the final without playing a single match. Those days, the whole competition was played on a knockout basis, with teams within the zones, eliminating one another for one of them to qualify for the inter-zone matches — in other words, for the semifinals, as it happened that season.
Madras beat Mysore but gave a walkover to Hyderabad, who were then drawn to meet Southern Punjab in the semifinal round. Wonder of wonders! They were given another walkover and entered the final without playing a single game en route. The other finalists, Nawanagar, were a powerful outfit with three members of the Jamsaheb’s princely family Yadvendrasinhji, Indravijayasinhji and Ranvirsinhji — descendants of the great Ranji and Duleep — in the eleven, and strengthened by the presence of L Amar Singh, S N Banerjee, Vinoo Mankad and the Sussex pro A F Wensley, who later coached and played in Madras. Also in the eleven was wicket-keeper Abdul Aziz whose gifted son Salim Durrani was to electrify Indian cricket stands decades later.
The final will forever be remembered as Eddie Aibara’s match, for his heroism it was that won the match for Hyderabad when it had all but slipped away. After yielding a first innings lead of 39 runs, Hyderabad had conceded their opponents 270 in the second venture, and therefore, needed 310 to win. Openers Asadullah (5) and S R Mehta (24) were both run out and soon the innings was tottering at 67 for 3. Aibara (137 not out) then steadied the innings with two partnerships of 60 and 74 with Hussain (32) and Hyder Ali (46), taking Hyderabad to 244 for 5. Three wickets fell for no run after lunch, but Aibara stood firm in the company of Ten and Jack, grabbing a thrilling one-wicket win. It was a magnificent performance by a great batsman who never played for India.
There were other unsung heroes in that unlikely Hyderabad win. Pacemen Ibrahim Khan — a humble soul if ever there was one and the father of Habib Khan and Sardar Khan, two fine fast bowlers — and Hyder Ali, who bowled superbly in both innings, had match figures of 6 for 109 and 9 for 147. S R Mehta bowled his off spin with purpose in the first innings and batted defiantly in the second.
For Nawanagar, Wensley and Mubarak Ali batted and bowled beautifully even as their more illisutrious teammates failed. Amar Singh had a poor match with the ball but made invaluable runs. His new ball partner Banerjee was among the wickets.
Two of the combatants of that match — A F Wensley and Eddie Aibara — went on to become much loved and respected coaches in pre-independence as well as independent India. For Aibara, it was the beginning of a successful run for Hyderabad before he joined Rajkumari Amrit Kaur coaching scheme at Patiala.
V Ramnarayan
|
