TONY BECCA

The first really exciting match in the World Cup was the one listed as match number eight in the second round of the inaugural tournament in 1975, it was the West Indies versus Pakistan encounter, and apart from being exciting, it was filled with drama.

With the West Indies winning their opening match against Sri Lanka - a non Test-playing team at the time, and Pakistan losing their opening match against Australia, the two teams met at Edgbaston in what was expected to be an exciting affair between the two most attractive teams in the world.

No one, however, expected what happened on that June day in Birmingham. In a nail-biting finish, the West Indies, 63 runs behind when last man Andy Roberts joined Deryck Murray, won the match by one wicket with only two deliveries to spare.

After winning the toss and electing to bat first, Pakistan, led by Majid Khan with 60, Mushtaq Mohammed with 55, and Wasim Raja with 58, chipped to 266 for seven in their allotted 60 overs, and with Sarfraz Nawaz picking off the first three batsmen in the order - Roy Fredericks, Gordon Greenidge, and Alvin Kallicharran, with Rohan Kanhai, captain Clive Lloyd, Viv Richards, Bernard Julien, Keith Boyce and Vanburn Holder back in the pavilion, the West Indies, recovering from 166 for eight, were reeling at 203 for nine when Roberts walked out to join Murray in the 46th over.

But for Lloyd, who scored 53, and Holder, who pushed and blocked for 16, almost every one of the West Indies batsmen in the pavilion was guilty of careless and reckless stroke play, and when Roberts took guard, they must have been kicking themselves.

The match, at that stage of the proceedings, appeared lost.

With Murray, 61 not out in 106 minutes off 76 deliveries with six boundaries, batting well after sharing a ninth-wicket partnership of 37 with Holder, however, with Roberts, 24 not out in 55 minutes off 48 deliveries with three boundaries, batting courageously and defiantly, and with the tension getting to the Pakistanis with each passing over and as the West Indies inched closer to the target, the Windies last pair posted 64 runs in 55 minutes and took the eventual champions to victory.

It was a day to remember. It was a day in which Pakistan, going for the kill, bowled out all their top bowlers, and with 59 overs gone, with one to go and the West Indies needing three runs to win, were forced to call on batsman Wasim Raja to bowl the last and most important over at the end of a match in which the West Indies, thanks to Murray and Roberts, stepped out of the grave.

by Tony Becca