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Finally in the Mohali Test Pakistani cricketers proved that they have the divine blessings whenever they play against India. With the weakest team ever to tour India, Pakistan eked out a draw with the host team, which is perhaps the strongest side in their history.
   Players like Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid and Sourav Ganguly are born once in hundred years. And what India got is a set of talented players who even outshine their stars.
   Virendar Sehwag far outshone their ‘Demi-god’ Sachin on many occasions when Laxman is one of the finest gifts India got in the middle-order. And it was for the first time in the cricket history of India their fast bowlers dominated a match when Pakistan struggled to find three quick bowlers for the team.
   Pakistan have got a wily leg-spinner in Danish Kaneria, who certainly will upstage Anil Kumble and Harabhajan with his spinning wizardry if he finds them alone.
   Therefore, before the first Test it was a battle between Japan and China in terms of their population.
   However, when it looked like India were cruising to victory Pakistan pulled off creditable a draw at Mohali.
   It seemed hard to bowl out India twice in a Test on batting surface with the Pakistani bowling line-up. So the only result they could think of was a draw which also seemed impossible at the mid-session on third day.
   A diehard Pakistani supporter must have remembered the instances Pakistani cricketers set a number of times converting the result for them. However, hardly anyone expected a rescue act against the brilliant Indian team which installed the right players in the right positions.
   One could expect a good innings from Yousuf Youhana or Inzamam-ul-Huq for their natural batting prowess but who would have relied on wicketkeeper Kamran Akmal, who partnered with Abdur Razzak and saved the match playing a 346-minute innings. Razzak struck only four boundaries in the second innings against five in the first innings in 27 minutes.
   What makes Razzak different is an eagerness to play against India and not against the favourites. No matter what lies ahead of Pakistan in the series they have now ample reasons to believe that they can fight against India, who are considered as one of the two top teams in the cricket world now.
   Indian coach already realised the circumstances and warned his team because he knows they have given back the confidence to the Pakistan side and took the pressure instead.
   The result of the first Test also turned the dull series into an exciting one. Indians must have wanted a lion and not a mouse to kill in their backyard. And ultimately cricket is the winner after the first Test of Mohali.

Former World Cup winner faces ‘biggest game’ after drastic treatment to restore his health.
   For Diego Armando Maradona, according to his doctors, this will have to be ‘the best game he has ever played.’ And even if ‘the hand of God’ remains with him, they say, he will still have to use his head to win this one.
   The former Argentinian star, suffering from what the doctors called ‘morbid obesity,’ has been tipping the scales at nearly 20 stone. Now, he’s had his stomach stapled down to half its size in a so-called ‘gastric bypass.’ By this time next year, he will be down to his fighting weight of 11st 7lb and playing football again. At least, that’s the theory.
   The $15,000 (£7,850) operation took place in the Colombian seaside resort of Cartagena de Indias. Maradona hopes the city’s renowned obesity surgeons have worked their magic. But the reality is that the operation is not without risk.
   ‘We can’t really say just yet whether he’s out of danger,’ said Dr Francisco Holguin, the leader of the four-member surgery team at the Medihelp Services clinic. ‘Complications can appear up to a month after the operation. But we don’t foresee any for Maradona. He has been the perfect patient, the best I’ve ever had.’
   Although the 44-year-old former World Cup winner walked out of the clinic at dawn last Wednesday, he stayed on in a luxury flat in the city’s exclusive Bocagrande district for continuing outpatient treatment at the clinic. He will have to spend a month on a liquids-only diet before returning to Cuba to deal with his other pressing problem, his addiction to cocaine.
   Given that addiction, his decision to have his stomach operation in Colombia, the world’s cocaine-processing centre, was perhaps a little risky, but Dr Holguin said, ‘Being overweight often causes people to turn to drugs or alcohol. Losing weight should raise his self-esteem. He’ll have a new image, and that will reduce the chances of him relapsing back into drugs.’
   Maradona’s personal physician, Dr Alfredo Cahe, added, ‘Maradona will have to embark on a new way of life. He’ll have to use his head and he’ll need help from his friends. You can have the best surgeons in the world but without love and warmth, it’s all useless.’
   Whether or not the man nicknamed El Pelusa, or ‘Fuzzy’ in his native Argentina because of his hair, can stay off drugs and out of trouble remains to be seen. There is also considerable doubt as to whether he will ever really grow up. ‘He always said that he had been taken to the peak of a mountain but, once there, nobody told him what to do,’ said his former wife, Claudia Villafane. ‘He never learned to cope with fame. He doesn’t want to admit what’s happening to him. He doesn’t even want to admit we’re divorced. He still keeps the wedding ring.’
   She said Maradona would have died if she and his family had not staged an ‘intervention’ and signed him into a Buenos Aires clinic last year after drug-related heart and lung problems.
   Between his Cuban drugs rehabilitation centre and the Colombian tummy-tucking clinic, he stopped off in Buenos Aires to do a TV show.
   On the show, apparently in an effort to show that doping scandals were common, and that he was not the only culprit, he ‘revealed’ an incident he said took place at the 1990 World Cup in Italy. In Argentina’s last-16 game against Brazil, he said, Argentinian training staff, on the pitch to tend to an injured player, managed to drug Brazil’s Branco by tossing him a bottle of water laced with tranquillisers.
   After the 1986 ‘Hand of God’ headlines, the Argentinian media swiftly dubbed this one the ‘holy water’ scandal, though Maradona insisted he had nothing to do with it. ‘Brazil missed 20 chances in front of goal that day. That was not my fault,’ he said.
   In Brazil, Branco did not take the revelations well. He said he had, indeed, felt drowsy late in the game, when a brilliant run by Maradona laid on the winning goal from Claudio Caniggia and dumped the favourites out of the tournament. ‘What if I’d been dope-tested after that game?’ said the Brazilian defender. ‘That could have ended my career.’
   Branco threatened to sue the Argentinian Football Federation but many in Argentina took Maradona’s ‘revelations’ with a pinch of the kind of white powder he is now supposed to stick to, and even that in lesser amounts for the sake of his diet.
   The Argentinian Football Federation and the team coach of the time, Carlos Bilardo, denied that the ‘holy water’ incident ever took place. ‘Maradona has to get real,’ said Bilardo.
   So the stomach-stapling, and losing nearly half his current body weight, is just the latest test for the little Argentinian. He also faces a £21m tax bill from the Italian authorities from his glory-to-disgrace days with Napoli, the club he led to their first-ever league title in 1987 but left in 1991 after failing a dope test for cocaine.
   ‘People ask me if he was rebellious,’ said Dr Holguin of the Cartagena clinic. ‘I say, no, he’s very nice, an extraordinary person. If he keeps up the diet, he should lose up to six kilos [almost a stone] a month. If he exercises, and stays away from drugs, he should be able to return to sport, to play golf.
   ‘Will he ever play football again? Sure, why not? Though perhaps only as a hobby.’
   — THE INDEPENDENT, London

Eminent sports writer, cricket commentator and Dawn columnist Omar Kureishi died on Monday. He was 77. Mr Kureishi was suffering from heart disease for some time but had continued with his journalistic work till his condition took a turn for the worse on March 3.
   He was moved to hospital, where he passed away on Monday. His Namaz-i-Janaza was offered at Masjid-i-Tariq in the Naval Housing Scheme, behind Mid east Hospital, after Asr prayers on Tuesday.
   Mr Kureishi was one of the most outstanding writers on cricket in the subcontinent, and his columns were also published in major newspapers abroad. But he was also a keen observer of political and social developments and wrote about them not, in his own words, with fury, but certainly with ‘exasperation and anger’.
   As a cricket commentator, Mr Kureishi, together with Jamsheed Marker, had ruled the air waves in the late ‘50s and ‘60s and counted many cricketers, most notably the late Abdul Hafeez Kardar, as close friends. The media centre at the Qadhafi Stadium in Lahore is named after Omar Kureishi.
   He had grown up as part of a large family of 11 children that was often on the move because his father, Col MA Kureishi, was a member of the Indian Medical Service and had many postings across India.
   Mr Kureishi took a degree in international relations from the University of Southern California in the early 1950s. He had his first encounter with the media and showbiz in the United States where he briefly worked with a radio station and played a small part in a Hollywood movie. He also went to the United Kingdom where he played club cricket.
   He was a classmate of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto in school in Mumbai and later at university in the US and their friendship stood the test of time. Mr Kureishi came to Karachi in the mid-‘50s and joined the defunct Pakistan Standard.
   Later, he became resident editor of the Times of Karachi. His brother, Sattoo Kureishi, lived near Karachi airport in a house called Air Cottage and used to hold regular weekly get-togethers there. ‘Friday Evenings at Air Cottage’ became a byword in Karachi’s intellectual and avant-garde circles, and Omar Kureishi soon became an integral part of the set.
   In the 1960s, PIA’s then chief, Nur Khan, persuaded Mr Kureishi to join the national flag carrier and together they contributed enormously towards the establishment of a sport infrastructure in the country, inducting many sportsmen into the organisation and providing them with a financial cushion.
   Mr Kureishi had a long innings in PIA, lasting almost till 1981, except for a brief interlude when he had fallen out with the then managing-director. When the Zia regime took over, he was asked, for political reasons, to leave the organisation.
   As a cricket commentator, Mr Kureishi travelled all over the world and filed dispatches for many newspapers, including The Pakistan Times, Morning News and The Guardian, London.
   He wrote regularly for Dawn for over 25 years, including a series of articles based on his memories of his time abroad and in Mumbai and Delhi. His books include Black Moods, Out to Lunch, The System, The Other Side of Daylight, As Time Goes By and Once Upon a Time.
   Mr Kureishi is survived by a son, Javed, and two grandchildren. He was awarded the Sitara-i-Imtiaz in 2001. He was always full of good cheer, and a scintillating company to be with. About his devotion to cricket, he once wrote, ‘What had been a passion became a love affair and with all the ups and downs in my life, cricket remained a constant’.
   — DAWN

Tennis umpires used to be the most abused adjudicators of professional sport as any of them who came under the fiery temper of John McEnroe or Ilie Nastase could confess to but now the disease has spread to rugby and football referees.
   The difference being that the abuse or criticism is coming from the men who are entrusted with setting an example to their players – the coaches – and the results are far more serious than a simple blast from McEnroe.
   This reached its nadir last Saturday when one of the most highly-rated football referees, Swede Anders Frisk, called it a day because of death threats received from Chelsea supporters.
   They stemmed from a contentious sending off by the 42-year-old of Chelsea striker Didier Drogba in the Champions League first knockout round, first leg match with Barcelona which resulted in the Spaniards turning round a 1-0 deficit at the time into a 2-1 victory.
   However, things were not helped by Chelsea coach Jose Mourinho alleging that Barcelona coach Frank Rijkaard had entered Frisk’s dressing-room at half-time which has been steadfastly denied by both parties.
   ‘I have so much experience that everyone should understand that I would never let a coach enter my changing room during a match,’ said Frisk, who refereed the Euro 2000 final between France and Italy.
   ‘I received threats by telephone, e-mail and the post. I have a big family and I am very worried. Anything could happen.
   ‘The game is just not worth all that,’ added Frisk, who was also hit on the head by a missile earlier in the Champions League by an AS Roma fan at half-time of their clash with Dynamo Kiev just after he had sent-off Roma defender Philippe Mexes.
   Frisk is the second high profile referee to retire after suffering such threats from the fanatical fringe of English fans.
   Swiss Urs Meier did the same – albeit he had reached the retirement age of 45 – after he was castigated for ruling out a late goal by Sol Campbell in England’s Euro 2004 quarter-final with Portugal – the Portuguese went on to win on penalties.
   However, unlike Frisk he contested that he had not received the support of UEFA.
   ‘I was correct to disallow Campbell’s goal,’ he said last year. ‘As a result I had the whole fury of England unleashed on me. No one at UEFA defended me. I was alone and that was very hard.’
   Mourinho’s outburst contrasted sharply with that of the ‘wronged’ manager in the Portugal case, England’s Sven-Goran Eriksson, a compatriot of Frisk’s, as he pointedly made clear.
   ‘I think when you’re a manager you have a responsibility, that’s one field that’s very important.
   ‘It’s not necessary to have the same ideas as the referees, I had that in Portugal but after 90 minutes you can talk to the referee, and then it’s finished.’
   That rugby union should also find itself in the dock is perhaps the most surprising thing as it has always prided itself on keeping things in house despite the physical intensity on the pitch with players still referring to the referee as ‘sir’.
   However, those were probably not words used by England coach Andy Robinson or Scotland handler Matt Williams against South African referee Jonathan Kaplan and Irishman Simon McDowell respectively.
   While Robinson received a slap on the wrist for his outburst about Kaplan’s refereeing of the 19-13 defeat by Ireland earlier this month Williams didn’t even get that for a venomous ‘we were robbed’ diatribe against McDowell, who as linesman denied the Scots a try in their 16-9 defeat by France.
   In a conspiracy theory which would have had even former American president Richard Nixon troubled to concoct Williams claimed that McDowell had denied his team three victories in successive matches.
   ‘Three outrageous decisions by the same official in three different matches and they keep on appointing him,’ stormed Williams, who has only three Test victories to his name since taking over from Ian McGeechan in November 2003.
   ‘Three times the same guy and same problem...do we have a problem with him. Yes.’
   Sadly the organisers were the ones who blinked first and removed McDowell from the next match he was meant to officiate at which involved Scotland – giving unnecessary ammunition to those who use the man in the middle or on the sidelines as a punching bag or easy cause to lament another loss.
   With the advent of innumerable different television camera angles the referee’s job has become almost impossible as the pundits and the viewer can see he has made a mistake - they fail to add that he has just a split second to make his decision and no recourse apart from in rugby, for tries, to revert to video technology.
   If wiser more reasoned counsel is to prevail among the coaches, who are men mostly in their 40’s and older, then they should take a leaf out of Ireland rugby coach Eddie O’Sullivan’s book.
   ‘It appears to be a new aspect of the game, coaches talking about referees,’ said O’Sullivan.
   ‘I’ve had games where I’ve been dissatisfied but I keep it between myself and the referee. It shouldn’t be made public.’
   Frisk no doubt would be the first to concur with that, and perhaps Mourinho on reflection would too as football has lost a huge asset.
   — AFP