‘The Greatest Rivalry: India vs Pakistan’ review: Nostalgia trip for 90s kids, but with few too many omissions

Opinions will always be divided over which is the greatest cricketing rivalry. It is a fact that the oldest of them all is The Ashes between England and Australia. While that rivalry still remains largely sporting, what India and Pakistan add to the table is the political angle.

But does that make India vs Pakistan the ‘greater’ rivalry? Ahead of every match – now restricted to ICC tournaments – broadcasters and campaigns tend to take jingoism to excessive, sometimes nauseating levels, as if life is meant to come to a standstill while the game is on. Players themselves have said that it’s the hype driving the contest, and not the actual cricket itself. The Ashes puts cricket first. But for the two South Asian teams in question, for better or worse, it’s politics first.

A new Netflix documentary series, The Greatest Rivalry India vs Pakistan, pitches this battle as a box-office hit the world should not miss. India and Pakistan have been playing each other internationally since 1952. This three-part series focuses on one period between 1999 and 2008 when the teams were perhaps the most closely matched in their history. Bilateral tours between the two were revived through sheer political will, and cricket was used as a tool for diplomacy.

The political backdrop aside, the actual cricket in the two tours in 1999 (in India) and 2004 (in Pakistan) produced some of the most iconic moments in India-Pakistan cricket – the standing ovation the Pakistanis got in Chennai, Anil Kumble’s 10 wicket haul in Delhi, Shoaib Akhtar- silencing a packed Eden Gardens, India beating Pakistan in Pakistan for the first time ever. This is not an exhaustive list.

For millennials in particular, this film would be a happy nostalgia trip to a time when cricket was purely two formats. For today’s Gen-Z, who were either not born or were toddlers in this era, it’s an insight into a period when India and Pakistan didn’t necessarily have to wait for a world tournament to play each other, as is the case now.

But was the cricket between India and Pakistan always this riveting? Simply, no. Deliberately or not, the film makes no mention of the snooze-fest India vs Pakistan was, for decades. The approach was not necessarily to win, but to ensure you don’t lose, because losing a series also meant losing the captaincy. Between 1952 and 1990, the teams played 44 Tests, out of which 33 were draws. There were 13 consecutive draws from 1952 to 1961, and a similar wave occurred in the 1980s with a further 11 Tests producing no results.

The Ashes wasn’t immune to draws or one-sided contests, but relatively, the approach was less conservative, thereby giving it an edge in the greatest cricket rivalry debate. It should be noted that the two tours covered in this film happened at a time when Australia enjoyed a monopoly over The Ashes, till England famously pulled it back in 2005. In this period, India vs Pakistan was the rivalry to watch.

The filmmakers did right by keeping the focus on India’s 2004 tour of Pakistan, a rare series devoid of boring draws and one that all those interviewed – Akhtar, Virender Sehwag, Sourav Ganguly, Inzamam-ul-Haq, look back at wistfully for the events both on and off the field. Pakistan journalist Osman Samiuddin recalls how the press corps felt the earth shaking under their feet at a packed stadium in Karachi for the first match of the tour. A good amount of airtime is given to the high-scoring thriller, and to coach Javed Miandad who turned into a wildly gesticulating football manager giving instructions to Moin Khan in the final over, when six was needed off the last ball. It cuts to present-day Miandad, re-enacting his last-ball six at Sharjah in his living room.

A still from the docu-series ‘The Greatest Rivalry: India vs Pakistan’.
| Photo Credit:
Netflix India/YouTube

Another curious omission is the controversy in Multan that divided a nation when Rahul Dravid declared the innings when Sachin Tendulkar was on 194. Instructions were given to speed things up in a bid to give India enough time to push for a win. It was a marked departure from the earlier strategy of self-preservation, but for days, that’s all people spoke about. There’s a chapter dedicated to this in author Rahul Bhattacharya’s Pundits From Pakistan, among the best tour diaries around.

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Archival footage taken in airports, banquets and presidential palaces etc are a delight, though the film could have done with fewer re-enactments of scenes and voiceovers, which are occasional irritants. The flamboyant Akhtar never fails to entertain, though he goes a bit overemotional towards the end as the film goes on a deeply sentimental route.

Today’s twenty-somethings may not fully be able grasp that sentiment simply because encounters between India and Pakistan occur once or twice a year. The dynamics have changed too. While India’s stocks have risen, both on the field and at the ICC board, Pakistan’s has deteriorated to the point where they are not serious contenders for winning trophies. Their poor record against India in ICC tournaments says it all. Australia has since replaced Pakistan as the healthy rivalry Indian fans look forward to.

With India refusing to tour Pakistan for the upcoming Champions Trophy, bilateral contests like in 2004 will remain a pipe dream. In the absence of regular Indo-Pak cricket, it pays to revisit an era when the rivalry was well and truly a great rivalry.