Rahul Dravid relives his epic innings against Australia in Eden Gardens Test in 2001

Rahul Dravid and VVS Laxman added 376 runs to set up a thrilling win for India.

Rahul Dravid

Former India captain and one of the greatest no.3 batsmen of all time, Rahul Dravid has played many unforgettable knocks over his career of 16 years. However, he considers himself more of a failure than success in international cricket.

Talking at the GoSports Foundation’s annual Athletes Conclave on Friday, Rahul Dravid said that “I am quite qualified to speak on failure,” Dravid said with a laugh. “I played internationals 604 times, but I didn’t cross 50 on 410 of those occasions. When you fail, you tend to brush a lot of things under the carpet. You try to blame someone, find an excuse. But it’s a really good opportunity to learn about yourself.

Rahul Dravid was present at the conclave along with India’s only individual Olympic gold medal winning shooter Abhinav Bindra.

Dravid took the opportunity to discuss dealing with pressure using the example of his epic innings against Australia in the famous Kolkata Test of 2001.

Rahul Dravid scored 180 and VVS Laxman scored 281

We had lost badly in Mumbai and my form wasn’t good. I was demoted to No. 6. When I was walking in during the second innings, Steve Waugh said ‘Rahul at 6? next Test at 12?’ But I just told myself, ‘let me see how many one balls can I play’. It was the simplest thing I could do and it worked,” Dravid said.

Rahul Dravid scored an epic 180 and added 376 runs with VVS Laxman, who scored a then record score of 281. The duo batted the whole of fourth day in order to setup a win for India.

It’s part of the history that VVS Laxman and I batted the whole day in Calcutta and we went on to win the Test match. Harbhajan Singh bowled beautifully well on the fifth day and we won the match and in Madras as well,” the former Indian captain continued.

 

 

 
 

By Jatin Sharma - 16 Dec, 2017

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