Lets put it this way. Chennai were not only the better team yesterday. Dhoni was the better captain too. I know a lot of people would focus on having that straight mid off as well as a long off. And yes, nothing succeeds like success. But that is not what ultimately won the game for Chennai. The little moves - such as investing trust in Murali even when the great off spinner was not having a great tournament, having fielders such as Badri and Raina at the right spots almost throughout the match and razor sharp wicket keeping allied with intelligent use of his part timer (again Raina) - those were the ones that won Chennai the game.
At the point that Pollard got out, the MI would have required a combination of West Indian voodoo and Indian mantra-tantra to get them across the finish line.
There is also a lesson in this. It is that it is very essential for the captain to sit down and discuss permutations and combinations and probabilities and decisions to be taken in key moments with his vice captain as well as the coach. Tendulkar came out in the post match press conference and said that Pollard was held back a bit too long. What does that imply? That he would have preferred to send Pollard in early? Perhaps so, we may never know. But I am happy that Tendulkar thinks that Pollard should have gotten in early. On the Pollard batting slot, I have heard a lot of people say that he ought to come ahead of Duminy. I will go one better. I would say that he ought to have come in ahead of even Rayudu. Or at the very least before Saurabh Tiwary.
Mumbai's fielding and its dependence on five specialist bowlers to do the job perhaps held them back. I thought somebody like Jayasuriya with the ability to roll his arm over may have made sense, but then you know what people say about hindsight.
Two moments probably told us all that this Test match was going to be far more exciting than your average limited overs contest. Or even the average Test match. In the 3rd over after tea, Harbhajan raised his hands towards the heaven before bowling the last ball of the over which again was bluntly and solidly smothered down by Hashim Amla. He was asking for divine intervention to help budge Amla from the crease. A couple of overs later, a half push off Ishant gently rolled down and disturbed the stumps at the bowlers' end. The bail lifted and fell back smartly into place, atop the stumps! Today was going to be special. We all knew it. And it was. India won at Eden. But South Africa did not lose. In Hashim Amla they won. Amla won the most hearts at Eden - India's premier ground for cricket - with his impeccable defense and almost preternatural concentration skills. At times one felt that he had gotten into the skin of the bowler and worked out exactly what variations are going to come up and when in each over. He never once looked like getting out. Which is precisely why India chose the smart route. They picked up everybody else leaving him stranded. Who said sport is fair?
The 22 yards
Now this is going to be tricky. If India had not managed to win this match, this is probably what would have been the assessment of the Eden track. Too much grass was left on the surface which meant that the wicket was solidly bound together. Perhaps too solidly. What we saw today was not a 5th day wicket. There was practically no wear. No rough areas. Not much spin. And it was not as if there was too much swing throughout the match - conventional or reverse swing. What this match did have was a spate of centuries - 7 to be exact.
Luckily for India the match ended in a result - despite Amla. But the result was by no means predestined. In fact I would go so far as to say that this was not a result wicket and hence not a good Test match wicket. There, I have said it.
But then India has won. So all this does not matter to most people.
The Game
As Ravi Shastri repeated more than once during his post match ceremony the match was squandered by South Africa in the first day's play - when Harbhajan made his triple strike. That combined with Zaheer Khan's canny post Tea spell put paid to South Africa's hopes of raising a huge first innings total and put it beyond India to win the game.
That apart we saw two blood and guts innings from Amla. He alone among the South African batsmen came to terms with the Indian bowlers, their nuances and their limitations. But that alone is not enough for a batsman to survive for over 20 hours in the course of a Test match. We can safely say that when Rahul Dravid hangs up his boots, the game will not be bereft of a 'over my dead body' type of batsman. Entrenched batsmanship lives on - thanks to Hashim Amla.
Graeme Smith's poor game (poor series as a matter of fact) had as much of an influence as Duminy's and Prince's 'all at sea' efforts in both the Test matches. However the South African bowlers - including the unheralded Paul Harris can hold their heads high and look forward to high marks for their unflagging efforts throughout.
Coming to the victors of the game, it is said that great teams win from difficult and near impossible situations. Things were close to being that desperate today. But when the chips were down, the No.1 ranked team pulled together and held its nerves better. Much will no doubt be made of India's achievement of winning the game with just 3 specialist bowlers - as they were without Zaheer Khan. A theoretical question though raises its head - did India necessarily need the extra batsman? Or would it have made more sense to include 5 bowlers? More on that later. Harbhajan and Ishant carried the day for India. Harbhajan's lion hearted performance was almost singularly responsible for this victory. In fact one is convinced that it was his frequent switching the line from over to around the wicket and back which planted the seeds of doubt in the minds of Morne Morkel who had been essaying a rock solid defense till then. Ishant did the hard yards and generally did the clean up work without any complaint. His bowling is ideally suited to be used as a stock bowler and that is what he was today. Ishant also deserves special mention for achieving the almost impossible feat today. He beat Hashim Amla's bat - once!
Amit Mishra's was a strange performance. It is not so much that he is not ready or fit to play at this level as his mental rigidity in continuing to bowl on or outside the off stump to right handed batsmen. In fact it probably helped Mishra on the 4th day that he was bowling to Smith first up and his line had to be outside off stump for the left hander. He got it spot on in that case. And then he got Kallis - the key wicket - with an almost perfectly pitched leg break. The key is to make batsmen play - leg spin or off spin. Or even spin or pace. A leg spinner bowling outside off stump will not take wickets unless they are given away by batsmen. At this level that is not such a frequent occurrence. And no matter how many times he beats the bat, he is unlikely to be very successful pursuing this line of attack. In fact with such a line, his most likely wicket taking opportunity would be with the googly. Just as he did in the case of De Villiers. It is almost as if he is a mentally scarred bowler - afraid to attack the leg stump. That will not do in the long run. I am sure Dhoni and the team management can coax the best out of this talented leg spinner.
Dhoni led his team adroitly, innovatively and in an unorthodox fashion. This statement is true for the post Tea session on the 5th day alone. He did all that he needed to do and some more when he needed to be most alert. However one felt that he did not have his hands on the pulse of the game earlier. More on that follows.
For now, the Indian team Test team will retire, tired but victorious and in great spirits. They have not only routed South Africa by an innings at Eden but also managed to remain the World's No.1 ranked Test team at the end of the series.
Emotions
There is an unwritten rule when you write about Indian cricket. Dont criticize the team, its captain and the selectors when a match is won. Criticism is reserved for those occasions where the team loses the match. And preferably when it loses badly. Not following this rule is an immediate ground for experiencing general derision, disbelief and at the minimum a quizzical look at your person as if to say 'You still have all your marbles?' If you want to break this rule you are either a brave soul or a proven fool. Because you can rest assured that you will not have company. You will scarcely find an 'expert' worth his salt wanting to dig up the negatives when India wins. The public does not want to hear about it. There are actually two ways of looking at this. This could be a good journalistic idea because it gives you a unique track to follow up on, theoretically. But see, in India, theory can only get you so far. Practically this is nothing but disaster and you are hardly going to get anybody to agree. Or this could be the inconvenient truth.
Now if only sport and journalism were about agreeing mutually...
In summary India drew a home series with South Africa. It was a pity that this was just a 2 Test series, not allowing each team to mark a clear margin of victory as is possible with a 3 or 5 Test series. The manner in which India drew the series as well as India's strategies throughout this 2 Test series leaves much to be desired.
The No.1 team in the world makes the play. It pushes the other team to match up to it. To do that it needs attacking team strategies. Stocking up on the batting even when you have talent and experience in the form of Sehwag, Gambhir, Tendulkar and Laxman was a strange decision. Especially when you consider that this left the arguably weaker portion of India's game - the bowling - even more weaker. Now, consider that the Indian bowling attack - especially the spin combo of Harbhajan and Mishra - did not have a great time of it against Bangladesh, should India not have added some additional muscle there?
It might even have turned out that in the final day's play here an extra bowler gets the wickets earlier and we may not have needed to endure the nerve wracking final moments. Yes, critics and supporters alike will point out that India won this Test. But that would be to miss the woods for the trees. India needs the ability to consistently take 20 wickets throughout the world on all types of surfaces. And considering India's excellent batting lineup - which was sans Dravid in this series - we ought to consider playing 5 bowlers to win matches. The argument that India does not have an all rounder does not wash well. Mahendra Singh Dhoni is our all rounder. He is the one man in this team who handles two disciplines of the game very well and holds his place down without question. That is the definition of an all rounder.
Yes - India won the game and are still the No.1 ranked team in the world. But this team should not get easily satisfied. They can go farther. Much farther. With attacking strategies and penetrative bowling in place, all they would need to do is get the big guns in the batting department to be consistent. Things are looking up - for India and for Test cricket. For South Africa, they ought to be disappointed they will not go back with a Test series win in India. They could very well have gone home with just that if the last wicket partnership had stayed on there for 2 odd overs. Approximately 12 balls were the difference between South Africa winning this series and India drawing level. Approximately 12 balls were the difference between the No.1 team and the No.2. This Test match was a fitting end to the Test season for India. Now they will focus on domestic ODI and T20 engagements with the IPL also around the corner. No better frame of mind to tackle those games than with a victory under your belt against the No.2 ranked team in the world!
The slightly innovative and 'free spirited' newspapers would have had a field day with headlines the day India was crushed by South Africa at Nagpur. 'India Steyned' - appears apt. Without taking much away from Steyn or from South Africa as a unit, I really do think quite a few have not talked about the actual problems which led up to this debacle.
As forthright and humble as Srikkanth is in offering up his head to be lopped off, I dont think he is the guilty party here. OK, to be exact, not entirely guilty. His was a mistake that has often been committed in Indian cricket. Of being more accomodating the more senior a player is. That sort of mindset will not take us anywhere. If Laxman is not fit, then why have him in the squad. This is not an away tour and there is not going to be a huge expense in having him back in the squad for the next Test. Why take the risk?
That apart the real guilty party would be the team management at Nagpur. The captain Dhoni and the coach Gary Kirsten and perhaps even the vice captain Sehwag. Basically whoever had the brainwave to push young Wriddhiman Saha to play as a specialist batsman when there were 3 young specialist bowlers sitting around in the dressing room. That is not the mindset of the No.1 team in the world. This is the mindset of a team which does not want to lose. Not necessarily wanting to win. Dhoni's tactics on the field (or absence thereof) in recent times lead me to believe that he is becoming more and more defensive as a captain. Again that is not something the No.1 team in the world should consider desirable. A captain unwilling to take judicious risks and throw in his hat cannot succeed in the tough arena of international cricket.
Yes - Laxman was not there and even more significantly there was no Dravid. But that does not mean that you push just about anybody to play as a specialist batsman. A bit of analysis allied with some common sense should have told the team management that our bowlers - especially the spinners - have not been especially penetrative. Even against Bangladesh. All the more reason to then include 5 bowlers to try and take 20 wickets instead of employing the defensive tactic of just throwing another body with a bat at the feet of the South African pacers - who resembled nothing but a pack of slavering carnivores licking their chops at the prospect of easy meat.
Talking about the positives in this Test match for India is also a tough task. Sehwag and Tendulkar each had a century in the first and the second innings respectively but the need of the hour was for a couple of batsmen to get centuries in the same innings! Instead of waxing lyrical about these batting performances, questions must be asked of the others who could not stand up when it was needed the most.
Dhoni does come up with strange statements from time to time. What surprised me this time was his statement that he actually was happy with his bowlers' performance. That gets one thinking what exactly would get the captain angry, if not this! All flak in the press descends on Harbhajan's shoulders and some on Ishant's. While I agree that Ishant needs to sit out for a period and rediscover his pace as well as prodigious inswing which so troubled every batsman, I actually thought Harbhajan was slowly progressing on the 2nd day of the Test match. However, I am not so keen on letting Mishra off the hook so easily. It could perhaps have something to do with the fact that I bowl leg spin in the casual league cricket I play, but his absolutely defensive line outside the off for the most part and his release angle of the ball leave much to be desired. His action is not even a bit round arm which means that he cannot afford to get closer to the stumps to release the ball. It also means that he cannot get that essential drift that a leg spinner so needs to deceive the batsmen in the air. What he gets out of his current style is the angle and the angle is one created because of his approach to the wicket. Not one which is generated out of the revolutions of the ball. This style will not get him the drift and the dip and then that crucial away movement. Consequently he will be predictable and will always pose a greater risk to the batsman when he is bowling the googly. Talking about him beating the bat when the ball was pitching outside the off stump, is in my mind, putting the cart before the horse. Yes, this is a harsh assessment but one that is the need of the hour when one is left rubbing their eyes for want of spinning talent in a country which was and is still known as the birthplace of quality spin.
This is not a time for witch-hunts and autopsies and other such pastimes which the Indian public is so enamoured of. This is just a time for our team to stand up and play its part. That of the No.1 team in world cricket. I am sure Ian Chappell would be enjoying a smug grin at the Indians' expense pursuant to the team's performance at Nagpur. When Ian talked about the Indians not having powerful enough bowling, he was right. But where I believe he was wrong was in using this fact to extrapolate that India did not deserve to be No.1. What he fails to understand that this Indian team just might be among the first teams in modern cricket which puts forward batting as a truly match winning aspect of its Test cricket. India just have a wealth of batting match winners in their lineup - starting from Sehwag at the top and stretching down to Laxman at No.5. That is phenomenal and this is what India has been, in the recent past, using to offset its customary bowling shortcomings. That is not to say that the bowling has always stood second. Of late the bowling too has come along but if we are frank, in the last couple of seasons, it really has been the batting that has struct terror into the opposition - no matter which part of the world India played in. Virender Sehwag is no small part of this new phenomenon. In fact he is a phenomenon on his own, but that one is for another day, perhaps.
People like Gavaskar are actually lambasting the selection committee for dropping Saha, Abhimanyu Mithun and Tyagi even without giving them too much of a look-in. As much as these lads perform on the domestic circuit, it is when they face up to the big boys in the nets that they can get their stamp - of either approval or of being a work in progress. Gavaskar being a veteran himself should have realized this. Instead the question to be asked of the selection committee probably is - why did they drop Dinesh Karthik in the first place? And it would probably take some 'expert' who is not associated with the BCCI to ask the question - why is Murali Karthik being ignored continuously and unfairly?
Coming back to the setback - this is a necessary one. Just so the captain and the team management realize the futility of a defensive approach towards this Test series. It does not help that this is just a 2 Test series - that too hastily hooked up by the BCCI when they found out the meagre number of Tests their team will feature in. If India wants to impose itself in the second Test it can do that by playing to its strengths and more importantly trusting its strength. And its strength is its batting - notwithstanding this debacle. Laxman will return and I hope better sense prevails and the team fields five specialist bowlers. The fifth bowler - apart from providing a wicket taking option will also help keep the main bowlers fresh. And in a Test match this is an invaluable asset. And one feels that Sehwag should be used more frequently. He was for the most part the best spinner to be seen in the first Test and should have had two wickets to his name had Ian Gould not missed an edge that Boucher got through to Dhoni on the legside.
But how do we trust the batting which let us down badly here? By giving it a chance to succeed. Our lineup needs a left hander in the middle just so that Harris is not allowed to loom large (pun intended) over the Indian middle order. This will mean that this is the lineup and the team that would make the most sense:
Virender Sehwag
Murali Vijay
VVS Laxman
Sachin Tendulkar
Gautam Gambhir
MS Dhoni
Harbhajan Singh
Zaheer Khan
Amit Mishra
Pragyan Ojha
Sreesanth
Let me be direct with this. I do not expect Dhoni to field this XI. This also does not reflect on Badrinath's performance in the first Test. He did well - considering that it was his debut match as well. But when thinking about the Indian team we dont have too much liberty to see if we have been fair to everybody. On the face of it it might appear shocking. However such harsh decisions are often necessary. Badrinath is certainly one for the future. If anything I see a future Dravid in Badri and a future Laxman in Murali Vijay. But that is the future and this the present. This is the combination that has the ability to serve the team best - in my mind.
If India lose the 2nd Test it will not be because we come 2nd in ability to the South Africans or for that matter anybody. It will be because we fail to think like leaders at the world stage.
Add Comments
Read More
Comments (4)