EDWIN SEERAJ
IN the first game of the just-concluded three-match One Day International series between India and host Zimbabwe, the young Indian opener, Lokesh Rahul, became the first Indian and the eleventh player overall to construct a hundred on his ODI debut since Dennis Amiss first achieved the feat for England against Australia at Old Trafford, Manchester in 1972.

Rahul, who had previously played five Tests and was recently involved in the Indian Premier League, witnessed his captain, Mahendra Singh Dhoni, winning the toss and asking Zimbabwe’s Graeme Cremer to take first strike.
India bowled out the opposition for 168 in 49.5 overs with the fast-medium bowler Jasprit Bumrah bagging 4 for 28, and though Karun Nair (7) went early with the score on 11, Rahul and Ambati Rayudu (62 not out) fashioned an unbroken 162-run second-wicket stand that propelled the Indians to a comprehensive nine-wicket win with some 7.3 overs to spare.
For his part, Rahul, under very little pressure, etched his name into the record books with a carefully crafted, unbeaten even hundred spread over 115 balls and blended with seven fours and one six.
In compiling his hundred on debut, Rahul followed in the footsteps of the afore-mentioned Amiss, Desmond Haynes (WI), Andy Flower (ZIM), Saleem Elahi (PAK), Martin Guptil (NZ), Colin Ingram (SA), Rob Nicol (NZ), the late Phil Hughes (AUST), Michael Lumb (ENG) and Mark Chapman (Hong Kong)-the only person from an Associate cricketing nation to do so.
It should be pointed out that for 37 years between 1972, when Amiss recorded his 103, and 2009 when Elahi distinguished himself, only two other players became members of this elite club. On the contrary, as batsmen became more aggressive, especially with the advent of the T20 format, seven others have joined the band in the six years between 2010 and 2016.
After the initial effort of Amiss in only the second ODI game ever, it was the then 22-year old West Indian opener, Desmond Haynes’ moment to launch his international career with a blistering hundred against the Australians in front of 13,000 jubilant fans at the Antigua Recreation Ground in St. John’s, Antigua on February 22, 1978.
The Aussies were ravaged with the mass signing of their top players to Kerry Packer’s World Series Cricket and were being led by the former opener and captain, Bobby Simpson, who had retired from the Test team a decade earlier. By far, the only other cricketer of pedigree in the party was the ‘demon’ fast bowler Jeff Thompson.
Theirs was a young, inexperienced squad coming up against a full-strength West Indian outfit led by the now seasoned Clive Lloyd and which included the batting bombshells Gordon Greenidge, Viv Richards and Alvin Kallicharran, the long-standing wicketkeeper Deryck Murray, and the exciting and effective fast bowlers Andy Roberts, Colin Croft and Joel Garner.
The teams were set to contest five Tests and two ODIs stretching over a 10-week period commencing with the first ODI at the ARG on February 22 and ending with the fifth Test in Jamaica on May 3.
In Haynes’ maiden ODI game, the West Indies were without the ebullient, left-handed opener, Roy Fredericks-a prominent signee for World Series Cricket-who had retired from international cricket at the end of Pakistan’s visit to the Caribbean in 1977, having played 59 Tests and 12 ODIs.
The selectors were, therefore, looking for someone to partner Greenidge at the top of the order and three candidates were identified to fill the role based on performance in the regional Shell Shield tournament and against touring teams-Haynes, the Jamaican off-spinning all-rounder, Richard Austin and the Guyanese stroke-maker Faoud Bacchus.
All three were in the final eleven with Haynes and Austin given the opportunity to start the innings while Bacchus batted at number five in the order after Richards and Kallicharran. In the absence of Clive Lloyd, who had not yet arrived in the region from his overseas assignments, Murray led the side for the first time.
Haynes had sound credentials, having cracked a shot-filled 136 for his native Barbados against the Pakistanis at the Kensington Oval a year earlier, and in the Shell Shield tournament in 1978 he had scores of 79 against the Combined Islands, 66 and 17 not out versus Trinidad and Tobago, and 79 and 51 against Jamaica.
At this stage of his career, he was an attacking, aggressive player who had all the shots but was guilty of gifting his wicket away when seemingly well set and lacked the fortitude to bat for long hours.
Batting first, the West Indies quickly lost Austin (8), Richards (9), Kallicharran (7) and Bacchus (0) and soon found themselves slipping from 56 for one to 78 for four as the bustling medium pacer Trevor Laughlin, Ian Callen and Wayne Clarke got among the wickets.
Bacchus’ second-ball exit-‘hit wicket’ as he essayed a big shot-was no doubt the most spectacular of the dismissals ,even as Thompson bowled at top speed without any success and was hampered by a series of no-balls.
Amidst all of the action, Haynes started off shakily and was troubled consistently by Thompson’s pace, but he weathered the initial storm to play a tremendously magnificent innings.
He took on all the bowlers and was later severe on Thompson, first adding a crucial 43 with the Dominican Irving Shillingford (24) for the fifth wicket, but when he (Shillingford) departed at 121 for five, the West Indies were at the crossroads.
However, Murray used his years as an international cricketer to great effect and combined with Haynes for a vital sixth wicket stand of 126 before the debutant was bowled by Thompson for a punishing 148 with the score 247 for six.
Haynes had faced only 136 deliveries and had pounded the boundary boards 16 times and went over them once as he became only the second player and the first (and still the only) West Indian to date to register a ton on his ODI debut.
With the aid of Murray’s 51, the West Indies closed at 313 for nine in their allotment of 50 overs as Thompson 4 for 67 and Laughlin 3 for 54 took the bowling honours.
The Aussies response was affected by rain and the target was adjusted to 270 from 36 overs. They reached 181 for seven with only the hard-hitting Gary Cosier putting up any notable resistance with a robust 84 from 78 balls with the assistance of 11 fours and a six to give the Windies victory by 44 runs and a 1-0 lead in the series.
After 38 years and 3,700 ODIs after Haynes’ innings of 148, it still remains the highest individual score by a player on his ODI debut. It is also a great distance ahead of the second-best by a West Indian in his first ODI-62 by Jamaica’s Everton Mattis against England at Arnos Vale, St. Vincent in 1981.
Based on his tremendous batting display, Haynes was pitch-forked into the Test team immediately and eventually had an illustrious career, forming one of the great opening partnerships of all time with Greenidge in both Tests and ODIs.
He finished with 116 Tests which produced 7,487 runs at an average of 42.29 with 18 centuries.
In the ODI arena, he was involved in 238 matches and accumulated 8,648 runs at 41.37 with 17 hundreds, 16 of which carried the West Indies to victory.
Who would be the next member of this ‘ODI Debut 100 Club’ is anyone’s guess.