Go well, King of spin

“Bowling Shaaanee!” Gilchrist's crisp voice rings in my ears. It's such a vivid memory that I heard him just as clearly even 20 years later. It rang even louder on that fateful Friday. It's not me alone that was reminded of that memory, but millions of cricket fans all around the world.  

I had an unopened WhatsApp text from AC as I was lazing on my couch that evening. I opened it and it was a link to an article from a leading newspaper with the HL: Legendary spinner Shane Warne no more. And then AC's words: "Is this true?" My heart skipped a beat. Of course, it isn't, I thought. What the fuck? How could it be? Have they confused Warne with Rodney Marsh, I thought, irritably, who had passed away a day before. THE legendary Shane Warne is no more? Could it possibly be true? Just before I could reply to him in my fit of confusion conflated with consternation, I thought I might as well check what this is about before brushing it off. And there it was... 

It really was Warnie. THE Shane Warne! Umm... what? how?! Suspected heart attack in Thailand, they said. But that was hardly the point, right? It couldn't be. It just couldn't. I couldn't say much besides a "yes" and his response came: "how sad". 

I had about a dozen WhatsApp messages by then; all expressed different forms of shock and despair. The pit in my stomach was growing as I began reading the various reports and the updates breaking out. Luxury resort... Koh Samui... My brain resisted, refusing to soak it in... 'They've got it all wrong,' it kept telling me. There much be some confusion. How can it even be? 

A magician. A revolutionary. A phenom with an elephantine appetite for life. He was Shane Warne  - the wizard of Oz that we knew. He made spin bowling look cool, imagine! He must have some superpowers that transcend the rest of us, surely? Wasn't he invincible?   

***

I’d always wondered how (and why!) Warnie was the Warnie he was. He was a magician, casting his spell on many a batsman for years together. The brash one with outlandish opinions; there were very few advocates for evolving the game of cricket as he was. He was a visionary. He showed the world the Gatting delivery  - the ball of the century - wasn’t a mere fluke. It was sorcery. 

He had his fair share of trouble off the field, but that just makes him more human, doesn't it? Yet, in the end, if there's anything that united the entire world in this moment of grief of his departure, it was the shared reverence and love expressed - brushing aside momentarily even the melee of Ukraine and Russia. Even in his departure, he brought those with the love for the game together, like he did over decades where watching Shane Warne and that Australian team in action awoke many in India without fuss. Watching the master in action was worth all those 4 am starts with a Structural Analysis book laying limp in my lap. 

Cricket lovers and even those that were indifferent to the sport were united on this day of mourning. I hope Warnie knew how much he meant to people and how he changed the world one ball at a time. 'c Gilchrist b Warne' will be etched in the recesses of my memory forever. Bowing out of Test cricket with Glenn McGrath was the goodbye I’d have liked to have been able to hold on to for a long, long time. But it wasn't to be. It sunk in deeper when a video of Ricky Ponting in tears surfaced. Damn... these were the same men that ruthlessly dominated opponents and were the most despised men at one point in world cricket. Yet... It was folly to expect their sense of invincibility to transcend into life, but that's what sport does to people.

...but at 52? 

'All the world’s a stage,

And all the men and women merely players;

They have their exits and their entrances;

And one man in his time plays many parts.' 

And who has played his parts better than Warnie did? Go well, King of spin.