Aravinda de Silva

As the T-20 World Cup was slipping away from Sri Lanka, fingers were pointed at the failure of the Lankan top order batsmen. The scenario brought to mind a man who seemed tailor-made for any ‘big match,’ man who possessed the temperament to plain sail no matter how tough the situation was. While playing match winning knocks in big games was a hallmark of Aravinda de Silva’s illustrious career, another feature that made him a unique batsman was his preference to do well against stronger opponents of his era, like Australia or Pakistan than, say Zimbabwe or Bangladesh.

If the West Indies possessed the best bowling attack in the 1980s, world’s fast bowling power base gradually shifted towards Pakistan in the 1990s, the era that Aravinda dominated. His eight Test hundreds against Pakistan is a World Record with two Australians Alan Border and Greg Chappell coming as joint second with six hundreds each.

Of those eight hundreds he scored, the first came in Faisalabad. On his 20th birthday Aravinda had remained 93 not out and the following morning he reached three figures by hitting a six off none other than Imran Khan.

"I was young and had just come into the side. Didn’t worry about all the big names and just went for it as it was there to be hit. It was a very pleasing experience, especially as my mother too had come to the ground to see me batting," Aravinda recalled.

Over the years, only four batsmen have scored more runs in Test cricket against Pakistan than Aravinda and that list includes some memorable names the cricket world has ever seen; Sunil Gavaskar, Greg Chappell and Alan Border.

What made him to do so well against the Pakistanis?

"Of all sides I played against, they had the best bowling side. They definitely had the best variation in world cricket. Unfortunately, at that time we didn’t play the West Indies that often and missed out on playing against the likes of Michael Holding, the late Malcolm Marshall and Joel Garner. As a result whenever I played against Pakistan, I used to concentrate hard. It was that much tougher facing them and you couldn’t lose focus as they had a balanced bowling attack that kept on asking questions. I guess it was the reason for me to do better against Pakistan than any other team," de Silva felt.

One of the much talked about games that de Silva has involved in against Pakistan is the Faisalabad Test during the 1995 tour. He had missed the first Test, due to his commitments with the English county Kent and Sri Lanka were heavily beaten in that match by an innings. Turning up for the second game in Faisalabad, he was the biggest hope for the Lankans, but came a cropper when he was dismissed for a second ball duck by Saqlain Mustaq. Incidentally, that was his first duck in Test cricket having played over 70 Test innings without a duck.

But he rose to the occasion in the second innings with a match winning 105 that helped Sri Lanka win the Test by 42 runs and square the series.

"I remember landing a day or two before the match in Pakistan. The second ball I faced, I just tried to on-drive, probably I was overconfident and managed to flick it back to Saqlain and I was caught and bowled. It was very disappointing as the team was expecting much from me. But that made me determined to do well in the second innings and score some runs. It was tougher in the second innings. We lost early wickets and the wicket wasn’t easy to bat on. It was very satisfying to score a hundred there. It was the first time I put into use all the experience I gathered in England."

With so much of playing experience behind him, who are the Pakistani cricketers whom he rates high?

"People like Imran, Javed, Wasim and Waqar were all superb players. But I feel that one player who doesn’t get mentioned in the same breadth is Abdul Qadir. He was a fantastic bowler. I feel, had he been playing in this era, he could have created a lot of problems for current players. Personally I rate him very high," de Silva said.

While speaking with ‘The Island’ about his memories of playing against Pakistan, Aravinda fondly remembered one moment of courage by his colleague and former captain Arjuna Ranatunga, when he won a Test Match that was slipping away.

Aravinda had played his part in that game in Rawalpindi with a century in the first innings and the Sri Lankans having dominated the game throughout, gave away the initiative chasing 220 runs when they lost five for 144. Soon Ranatunga was hit by a vicious Waqar Younis delivery and had to retire hurt and further examinations revealed that he had multiple fractures on his fingers.

Sri Lanka slipped to 177 for eight and requiring 43 to win with just Muttiah Muralitharan in the pavilion, Ranatunga walked in to bat against medical advice and saw the team through.