ENGLAND V INDIA TEST MATCH

Bombay Gymkhana, Mumbai, India (16-18 September 1999)

The only “Test Match” previously played between the two nations was in Leeds several years ago, and the Indians were comprehensively beaten on that occasion. Sponsored by Riley´s, the first Test Match to be contested in India was held in Mumbai (Bombay) the home town of joint-promoters Michael Ferreira, former World Amateur Champion, and Alex Fernandes of Sylvester Sports and Entertainment. Looking for a new format to “generate some excitement” they came up with a programme of 16 matches—singles and doubles— spread over three days, each match being the best of five 150-up games. The requirement for the baulk-line crossing was applied between 80- 100 in any break. There was provision for a deciding match in the event of the teams finishing level at 8-8

Two of the doubles matches would be the normal format, but for the remaining two the strange system of alternate-shot would be played. For this, both players in the team would have to stand at the table and take alternate shots to build a break. This idea was tried in Wigan several years ago when highly-ranked singles players generally struggled with the format. The unlikely pairing of Manoj Kothari and Ian Williamson won that particular event, routing some formidable opponents in the process.

The English players arrived the day before the scheduled start and Mike Russell immediately located himself in the billiard room of the Cricket Club in Mumbai for some preliminary practise.

England
 Mike Russell (captain), David Causier, Peter
Gilchrist, Chris Shutt. 
India 
 Geet Sethi (captain), Nalin Patel, Ashok
Shandilya, Devendra Joshi

Day One

In addition to the main sponsorship by Riley´s, Prudential ICICI, the President Hotel and Pepsi also acted as co-sponsors. The Indian television company Doordarshan gave live coverage of matches throughout the event.

The Indians looked to their captain, four-time World professional champion, Geet Sethi to give them a good start, but he appeared to be sadly out of touch as Chris Shutt romped to a 3-0 victory. Sethi´s highest break in the three games was just 32. Shutt made breaks of 50 and 58 (unfinished) in the first game, a 96 in the second, and two 40s in the third, which were sufficient to see him through.

A scoreline of 3-1 did not reflect the closeness of the contest between Peter Gilchrist and Ashok Shandilya, who would prove to be the best performer of the Indian team. Breaks of 46 and 44 gave him an advantage of 124-68 in the first game before Peter Gilchrist put together an unfinished 83 to go one-up. Shandilya came back with a century in the second to draw level. Although Shandilya made a break of 86 in the third game, he could not stop Gilchrist from taking it, aided by a break of 57. Shandilya looked all set to level things up with an opening break of 118 in the fourth, but leading 146-30 he missed the red and Gilchrist coolly wrapped up the match with a run of 118 unfinished.

In the third of the singles matches, David Causier was always in charge against Nalin Patel. With breaks of 71 and 70, Causier won the first game 151-60. He made a run of 94 to take the second, and then completed a fine victory with breaks of 67 and 59 unfinished.

The English captain Mike Russell was looking particularly ruthless against Devendra Joshi in the final singles match of the day. After he had taken the first game with a break of 79, Joshi came back to tie the scores at 1-1 with two good breaks of 99 and 46 in the second. Joshi also briefly led 42-19 in the third, but in missing a tricky in-off he let in Russell, who with icy determination put together an unfinished 131. In the fourth game, Russell took an early lead with a 47 and pressed for home with an unfinished 60 to continue the English team´s winning streak.

Gilchrist and Shutt made a good start, having things all their own way in the first two games. During this time, Patel and Sethi were unable to build a break bigger than 27. In the second game Gilchrist, who was experiencing some problems with his tip, borrowed his partner´s cue. This was obviously to his liking as he immediately cracked in a break of 110 unfinished with it. Sethi fought back with an 129 unfinished to claim only the third game of the day for the home team, but the match was over in a flash as the English took the next game 150-30, including a break of 122 by Gilchrist.

The contest was rapidly turning into a procession and this was reinforced when a break of 114 unfinished snatched the first game from the grasp of Shandilya/Joshi when they were well placed to win. However, they returned the compliment with a 92 unfinished in the second game after trailing 59-70. The third game was tight, but at 78-96 Joshi produced a vital 50 to establish a 2-1 lead. A century break at the second visit in the fourth game sealed victory for the Indian team in what had, until then been a totally disastrous day.

Day Two

Taking account of England´s impressive display, the odds were now heavily in favour of the Test ending on the second day. In order to make full use of a large chunk of TV time available on the final day, the organisers hastily rearranged the schedule of play and instead of six matches (four singles and two doubles) on the second day there would now only be two doubles matches.

The format of the doubles moved from alternate-visit to the far more difficult alternate-shot. In the first of theses Mike Russell and David Causier, destroyed their Indian counterparts Geet Sethi and Nalin Patel 3-0. It started at their third visit when the Russell/Causier combination put together an impressive run of 135. The Indians had difficulty adapting to the unusual system, their best break of the match being just 39. Sethi had moments of fluent shot making but Patel appeared uneasy with the format and proved to be the weak link in the combination. His worst moment came in the second game after the Indians led 70-35 and were looking good to level the match. At this point Patel missed a simple red pot and left the opposition with an excellent opening. Russell and Causier, didn´t need a second invitation and cracked an unfinished 115 to take the game 150-70. With the third game continuing in much the same vein the English team had no trouble in extending their overall lead to 6-1.

Joshi-Shandilya gave India a glimmer of hope by taking the last match of the day. They hit an impeccable rhythm and gave neither Shutt nor Gilchrist the time to settle down. Early breaks of 84, 98 and 91 in each of the three games left the English pair struggling to recover from a hundred points down on each occasion. They almost pulled it off in the first game after they trailed the Indians 71-121. A break of 50 brought the scores level and another of 25 saw the Englishmen come to within four points of taking the first game. But when Joshi converted a difficult drop-cannon off the bottom cushion to seal the first game 150-146, confidence swelled in the home team and they didn´t look back from that point. The Indians established big leads of 104-2 in the second game and 107-2 in the third; while Shutt and Gilchrist managed breaks 80 and 72 in response it was too little too late

The last day began with the Indian team needing to win all four singles to take the test into the one-match tie-breaker. In the original draw Russell was to have been paired against Sethi in the first match of the final day. Under the rescheduled arrangements it had been intended that he played Sethi in the second match, which would be covered live by the television company. However, Russell vetoed this idea, and after some hasty re-organisation it was agreed that he would play in the first match against Devendra Joshi and Causier would appear in the televised games against Sethi.

Mike Russell opened the match with an unfinished break of 154 to go one-up against Joshi. A 127 in the second made it 2-0, Joshi´s only visit to the table producing a break of two! The home team had something to applaud as Joshi won an error-prone third 151-123, but Russell settled matters with an unfinished 124 in the fourth.

When Sethi came back from a 2-110 deficit to win the opening game with a classy unfinished break of 148, it appeared that the home team was finally putting itself back on track. The bubble burst in the second game when Sethi, stepping up to the table scoreless on his third visit played the wrong ball, selecting Causier´s white ball instead of his own yellow! Causier never looked back from that point, wrapping up the match 3-1

Ashok Shandilya again underlined that he was India´s best player in the series, and looked like winning the first singles match for India against a player six places above him in the current World rankings. Shandilya started with a century break but incredibly still lost the first game. He faltered when 137-110 up, missing a cannon and allowing Gilchrist to steal the game with an unfinished break of 46. He came back to take the second and third going up 2-1, but Gilchrist had plenty left in him. He took control of the fourth game with a solid break of 41 to open and 97 to close, but saved the best for the decider. Shandilya opened with breaks of 73 and 26 against three blank visits to the table by Gilchrist, but the 1994 World Champion took his next chance to compile a perfect 150 unfinished, much to the delight of Chris Shutt and David Causier who were watching in the audience. This win gave England the match by nine points to two.

At the presentation, Peter Gilchrist accepted the crystal Riley´s Trophy from Major-Gen (retd.) Eustace D´Souza and the winners cheque for £6,800. Indian captain Geet Sethi took a cheque for £4,200 on behalf of his team. The event was unfortunately overshadowed by the absence of England team captain Mike Russell who had taken an early flight to New Delhi in order to join his Indian wife and in-laws. Sadly, he did not inform the organisers, who were less than pleased by the circumstances of his departure and were considering lodging an official complaint with the WPBSA.

Tournament promoter Michael Ferreira, who had captained the Indians at the first Test Match in Leeds, stated that he would like to see the event become an annual feature on what is currently the rather sparse professional billiards calendar. It is possible that next year could see a three-way event featuring India, England and a Rest of the World Team composed of players from the other billiards playing nations, Australia, Thailand and Malta were specifically mentioned. It remains to be seen whether the problems experienced by this event dampen the enthusiasm to carry this through.