A most special Draw

Congratulations Rahul Dravid and to the rest of the team and the country. What a fine team performance to break a 21 year old drought! Kudos to Karthik, Kumble, Dravid, Saurav, Zaheer, Sachin, Dhoni, R P Singh, Jaffer and just about everybody else. Don't even bother to think about the could have been 2-0 barrage of nonsense. While I myself never supported Dravid's move to not enforce the follow-on, but if Dravid had even an iota of doubt and just wanted to seal the series, I am all with him. When you have seen your country being battered overseas for ages, a series win is special. Losing hurts, looking at past history, even a draw is great, but a series win - that's special, something to be savoured, not to be dissected - at least not for now.

Andrew Miller at Cricinfo has summed up my emotions and that of the team beautifully, when he writes:

"India's fans may not appreciate it right now, as they quibble about the reasons behind Rahul Dravid's safety-first approach, but this draw will one day be looked upon with similar fondness."

Miller also points out what even Dravid's rival captain agreed to:

If I'd have been in his position I'd have done exactly the same," said Michael Vaughan. "They were 1-0 up and they want to make sure they win the series."

And we did win the series, didn't we? So cheers and thank you Team India for this most wonderful 60th birthday gift to the nation.