Thread by @RandomCricketP1

As memorable a picture as it is, Sourav Ganguly waving his shirt at Lord’s in 2002 was actually the final shot in a fairly long montage of India-England acrimony that had brewed in the 10 months before that evening in Lord’s. Here's a longish THREAD on what all led to it. 👇

People who know a bit more about the incident would know of it as a reply to similar actions by English all-rounder Andrew Flintoff after England won the final ODI at Wankhede in February earlier that year to level the series 3-3.

But Flintoff’s actions themselves were a culmination of an acrimonious tour of India for the Englishmen. In fact, had it not been for the 2001 series against Australia which overshadows much of cricketing action from that year, that series would be talked about a lot more.

And probably not too fondly.

The incident that is believed to have sparked the bitterness was the dismissal of Michael Vaughan in the Bangalore Test. The opener was adjudged out Handled the ball when Indians appealed after he had thoughtlessly took the red cherry in his

hands off the bowling of Sarandeep Singh. The Englishmen felt the appeal wasn’t in spirit of the game. And the rumblings began.

In India’s innings, Nasser Hussain resorted to tactics that many in the press box called Jardine-sque and many straightaway gasped ‘Bodyline 2.0’.

Negative tactics and the negative field placements resulted in seven straight maiden overs. At one point, Sachin complained to the umpires of the tactic but it resulted in the English captain giving the Indian batsman an earful and even led to

some ungainly scenes of finger pointing. Later in the day, for the first time in his Test career, Sachin was out stumped in the match while advancing down the track to hit Ashley Giles for a biggie.

The ODI series continued in similar vein and tempers flared more over poor umpiring and trivial issues. SK Sharma gave no balls when the English bowlers hadn't overstepped, gave sixes without consulting the third umpire when the ball had dropped inside the rope and then gave

Marcus Trescothick out when he hadn't nicked, all in an ODI which began with Hussain complaining about practice facilities. One of the many uglier incidents saw Nasser Hussain himself appealing for obstructing the field against his counterpart Ganguly in the Kanpur ODI.

And when India gave up its 3-1 lead in the ODI series to allow England to go home with a 3-3 draw, the media came down heavily on the team, labelling them chokers. The Indian Express' headline for the 6th ODI was "Final act, choking scene: India's storyline remains unchanged".

The contrasting expressions on Ganguly's and Hussain's face with the trophy at the end of the ODI series tell a tale. Ganguly had himself played two brilliant knocks in the last 2 ODIs but failed to take his team over the line and saw Flintoff who was once his not so favorite

teammate at Lancashire (Flintoff would go on to write some not so nice things about Ganguly in his book later) having the last laugh when he dismissed Javagal Srinath. Flintoff and Co. took a victory lap after the match, further incensing the Indian captain who had to return to

Kolkata with heavy security at the end of the series as England enjoyed their 'moral victory' over the hosts. All of this had made the tour to England later that year very important for the young Indian team and they began a glorious period with the Natwest win that culminated

with their ascent to World Cup Final in March 2003. So, this is all that had happened when England had toured India and led to a rather over the top but now iconic celebration from the Indian captain. There is another thread on a match from a series that took place between

these two where Yuvraj and Kaif gave early glimpses of what they were capable of. Check out this thread if you want to know about the series-winning partnership between Yuvi and Kaif that foreshadowed their Lord's heroics on 13th July 2002.

Also present at Lord's on that day was @gbhimani and he picked this photo as one of his favorites on the podcast that I do around favorite photos of guests. It gave me an opportunity to ask him whether this match would be so big had Dada not celebrated that way? Hear his answer