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October 27, 2009
As for fielding, our servants can do that for us
Posted 3 weeks, 3 days ago in Australia in India 2008-09
To understand the mind of the Indian cricketer, it is necessary to borrow from the 19th century French writer Villiers de l’Isle Adams, writes Suresh Menon in Mumbai Mirror. In his dramatic poem Axel, the lovers decide to kill themselves because the alternative is so trivial. “As for living,” says Axel, “our servants can do that for us.” And that’s the connection between French Symbolist literature and Indian cricket. Our players seem to be saying, “As for fielding, our servants can do that for us.”
Why do young, fit athletes struggle to bend so much? Or appear off balance when throwing? Is it time the Indian team laid down some qualifying rules – speed of foot, ability to hit the stumps and so on – before a player is considered for selection? Fielding is crucial in all forms of the game, especially the shorter versions, and India’s approach is embarrassing.
The reluctance to run shows itself while batting too. Well as Harbhajan Singh and Praveen Kumar batted towards the end, they certainly sacrificed more than four runs while admiring their shots or assuming that the ball would go to the boundary or running only a single when with better planning they could have run two.
October 26, 2009
Problems aplenty for India
Posted 3 weeks, 4 days ago in Australia in India 2008-09
The specialist batsmen failing to get going and the bowlers inability to change pace, are two key areas that cost India the match, according to Sourav Ganguly. Read his column in the Times of India.
Prem Panicker shares that view, and writes on his blog Smoke Signals that Ishant Sharma must take the new ball ahead of Praveen. Panicker also writes that perhaps it is time for Sachin Tendulkar to bat at No. 3, and let Gautam Gambhir take over the opening slot. if the brief for SRT — or more likely, the brief he has prescribed for himself — is to bat long, he needs to come in at number three, ceding the opening slot to Gautam Gambhir, who works well with Sehwag, is tuned to turning the strike over rapidly, and is temperamentally tuned to using the power play overs to optimum. One of the odd faults of SRT, among many good qualities, is his insistence on picking his slot in the batting order; IMHO, that will need to change if the team is to fire as a batting unit.
Given their performance in the series opener, India will have to field better if they are to have any chances against Australia, writes Ravi Shastri in the Hindustan Times.
With an international calendar so packed that players are literally going from one tournament or series into another without time to catch their breath, the needle is slowly being eroded. Anand Vasu in his blog on the Hindustan Times website feels there is no bite to the ODI series between India and Australia this time around.
October 24, 2009
Hard cricket, not hard talk
Posted 3 weeks, 6 days ago in Australia in India 2008-09
The tempered approach of the Australians to the seven-match ODI series against India might just be tactical. Illustrating the point, Ayaz Memon in his column in Daily News & Analysis also highlights the fresh focus and outstanding young talent that the visitors bring with them.
November 20, 2008
India played meaner, tougher cricket
Posted on 11/20/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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Call it heads, Punter
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In the Sportstar, S Ram Mahesh lists ten points that made the difference between the winner and the loser in the recent India-Australia series. Here's No. 1:
The simplest thing Ricky Ponting could have done to revive his side’s fortunes was to change his call to heads. He didn’t, and Australia lost three straight tosses — not all-determining, but serious concessions in these conditions. It wasn’t a coincidence that the only Test Australia dominated was when Ponting got lucky. Champion teams often take the toss and the conditions out of the equation, so flexible and varied are their cutting edges, but thi s Australian side, considerably less formidable than its predecessors, suffered. The batsmen were denied access to the best batting conditions; the bowlers, forced to go first when the surfaces were less abrasive, were often deprived of reverse swing.
November 12, 2008
The killer blow?
Posted on 11/12/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Is the Australian cricket team being written off too soon?
Aakash Chopra agrees with the thought, since it would be too premature, considering that the Australians had held top spot for more than a decade. Dominic Cork, in his rebuttal, believes that the spat between Ponting and Lee is just the tip of the iceberg. Read the engaging debate in thier blog on the Guardian website
November 11, 2008
India stooped to conquer
Posted on 11/11/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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It wasn't a series to remember for Ricky Ponting
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Peter Roebuck writes in the Sydney Morning Herald that although India were the better team and deserved their win, the way in which they completed the series left a lot to be desired.
India stooped to conquer. Only 21.3 overs were bowled in the morning session, a ruse designed to slow the scoring and to bring bad light into play in the event of the Australians putting up a sustained fight.
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If this is the best Test cricket has to offer, then it is not worth the bother. For all the weight it carries, it is still a game. Slow over-rates are a blight and an insult to the paying public. Hereafter, lunch must be taken not at a set time but once 30 overs have been bowled, with play to resume on schedule. That'll hurry things along.
In the BBC, Mihir Bose writes that aTest series win, even one as emphatic as India's over Australia, does not change the cricket world. But what made this series remarkable, he feels, is how often Australia played like India and India played like Australia. Australia specialised in letting India off the hook. The script when playing Australia is not meant to be like this.
An editorial in the Hindu says that after their 2-0 defeat, Australia remain the No. 1 side but have lost their aura. It says the main difference between the two sides was the bowling.
... confronted by difficult conditions, Australia’s bowling was exposed for its lack of skill, control, and imagination. The absence of a front-line spinner — before Jason Krejza’s expensive but potent fourth Test debut — hurt the visitors badly. Great sides have versatile and balanced attacks that can take wickets differently in differing conditions.
In the same paper, Steve Waugh writes the Australian team lacked a spark right through the series. He also has some high praise for Man-of-the-Series Ishant Sharma.
the true superstar in the making is Ishant Sharma ... He has incredible accuracy, is fast, has height and is a quick learner. He reminds me of Glenn McGrath in his accuracy and of Jason Gillespie in his hand speed.
Continue reading "India stooped to conquer"
November 10, 2008
The advantage of having Warne
Posted on 11/10/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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It is doubtful that Warne ever would have fretted about over rates, and certain that no captain with Warne in his side would have bothered
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When the Australian cricket team was at its best, it followed process, but also hunches and inspiration, writes Greg Baum in the Age.
In concentrating all its thinking on its incredibly slow over rate on Sunday night, Ricky Ponting's team appeared to obsess itself with crossed Ts and properly dotted Is and neglected the essence of its mission in India. It failed where it was once infallible, in its imagination.
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But Ponting then had the advantage of Shane Warne in his side. In the context of today's debate, Warne had three great strengths. His wicket-taking exploits emboldened Australia in a way that it cannot be bold now. The thinness of Australia's attack in India has forced it onto the defensive, and it looks to have become a mindset. Mere wishing will not make it otherwise.
Warne also was a maverick who was sceptical of cricket's painstaking processes. He could afford to be in a way that others could not and cannot. It led him into conflict with team management, but it also meant that he could see possibilities, however absurd, when Australia was in trouble and, being Warne, realise them.
It is doubtful that Warne ever would have fretted about over rates, and certain that no captain with Warne in his side would have bothered.
Thirdly, Warne was both a spin bowler and indefatigable. It meant that he bowled many overs, quickly, giving Australia a perhaps unmerited tract of the high moral ground in the over rates debate.
Jon Pierik in the Herald Sun writes that how Ricky Ponting reacts to criticism of his captaincy in the next couple of weeks will be crucial for Australia's longer-term prospects.
Test cricket is not just runs and wickets
Posted on 11/10/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Seduced by the notion that 350 runs in a day's play is entertainment, we sometimes ignore that it can be a chore to sit through when the bowling lacks penetration, writes Gideon Haigh in the Daily Telegraph.
For the media to complain about the entertainment value on the basis of the runs scored was like a complaint against Picasso for using too few brush-strokes.
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Here is a tension. We are anxious that Tests justify themselves as spectacle, but can't abandon the idea that more is at stake. It is a neurosis rooted in Twenty20's intimidating popularity, and Test cricket's abiding hold on our imaginations. In fact this Border-Gavaskar Trophy has given great value. Two exquisitely-matched teams with a lot of history and good cause to distrust one another have shown a ton of courage, skill and even civility.
How to innovate Test cricket out of existence
Posted on 11/10/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Empty stands, defensive tactics, too many draws - the series in India has not been what Test cricket required after a year in which Twenty20 has taken the game by storm. Robert Craddock in the Daily Telegraph paints a grim picture.
This is a heartbreaking sentence to write but it is the inescapable truth - Test cricket is in big trouble. Series between Australia and India are traditionally a magnificent pep pill for the game, providing storylines that stimulate the cricket world.
Test cricket needed that to continue this series but instead we got a batch of grim arm-wrestles on featureless wickets before poor crowds, enhancing the suspicion that Test cricket is in decline. After 131 years she is a robust old thing and won't die overnight - she might not even die at all. But she will be systematically downgraded by a thousand small cuts and it's started already.
After witnessing the tiny crowds in Nagpur, Simon Barnes wonders in the Times whether the pursuit of excellence is a legitimate reason to run a professional sport.
Most players are agreed that the complexity and infinite variability of Test-match cricket make it the highest form of the game. It's just that fewer spectators are interested in the higher form of the game, at least as a paying spectacle. The primacy of Test cricket is being maintained, but it is for reasons other than spectacle or money.
Continue reading "How to innovate Test cricket out of existence"
Where to next for Krejza?
Posted on 11/10/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Robert Craddock writes in the Courier-Mail that Jason Krejza's Test debut has been difficult to rate. He has taken 12 wickets but will he be a success in the future?
The temptation is to say the Australian selectors must be doing handstands over Krezja but we remember that Nathan Hauritz took seven wickets on his debut in the corresponding Test of the last Indian tour and never played another Test.
Beau Casson showed some promise in his debut against the West Indies this year – and he hasn't been sighted since. Off-spin is a devilishly tough trade, particularly on hard, unsympathetic Australian decks, which explains why no Australian offie has taken 200 Test wickets.
November 9, 2008
What was Ponting thinking?
Posted on 11/09/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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Ricky Ponting may have denied his side the chance of retaining the Border-Gavaskar Trophy
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Ricky Ponting has denied his side a deserved chance of securing a famous victory by using part-timers instead of his seamers in an attempt to up the over-rate, writes Peter Roebuck in the Sydney Morning Herald.
Somehow, a group of experienced cricketers and leaders managed to convince themselves that the over rate was more important than the match. At tea, Indian were in trouble. In the ensuing two hours, Dhoni and Harbhajan Singh stroked the ball around cheerfully, adding 100 runs in 100 minutes. It was the most staggering passage of play seen on a day that also included five penalty runs when the keeper threw a glove at the ball, and four overthrows given away by a fieldsman tying his laces. Indeed it was the most incomprehensible spell seen from an Australian team for a quarter of a century.
In Sydney's Daily Telegraph Jon Pierik writes that Ponting had every reason to hang his head in shame last night after allowing India to escape the noose in the fourth Test.
What a joke. With wickets desperately needed, Ponting had to roll the dice and unleash chief strike weapons Mitchell Johnson, Brett Lee or Shane Watson immediately after tea. Instead, he turned to the part-time spin of Cameron White, who has five wickets in the series, and Mike Hussey, who has never come close to one in his Test career, to hurry through the overs with frontline spinner Jason Krejza.
The Australian's Malcom Conn calls it Ponting's worst day as captain while Dileep Premachandran terms the post-tea session "surreal" in the Times.
Does Test cricket want to survive?
Posted on 11/09/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
After a day when only 166 runs were scored, Peter Roebuck was so bored by the cricket that he thinks spectators ought to have been paid to watch. He writes in the Sun-Herald that the worst thing about all the accusations of defensive cricket this series is that they are true.
At the very time the five-day game is most vulnerable it has been treated with contempt. Cricket is not let down by snorting fast bowlers prone to occasional lapses but by the sort of tactics and tacticians prominent during this self-absorbed series. Far from nurturing a game they supposedly cherish, they have harmed it.
In the Times of India, Bobilli Vijay Kumar takes a different view. He praises Dhoni's tactic of packing the offside field and choking the runs by keeping the attack a foot outside off stump.
And in the Hindustan Times, Pradeep Magazine marvels at the new world-class stadium in Nagpur but is unhappy with the lack of effort to attract crowds to the Test.
How India undid the Australians
Posted on 11/09/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
New Zealand are looking to take inspiration from India on how to overcome the Australians. Dylan Cleaver in the Herald on Sunday feels one of the tactics would surely be to curb Ricky Ponting, who has been reduced to mere mortal in the ongoing Test series. While Iain O'Brien could serve as an Ishant Sharma for New Zealand, across-the-seam bowling coupled with the lack of a world-class spinner may also prove to be Australia's Achilles heel in their next assignment, at home to New Zealand.
The other tactic India have used more successfully is across-the-seam bowling, an art that has become trendy again, particularly on flat, dry pitches.
Basically, once the immediate effects of the new ball have worn off, in the subcontinent that could be before the first 10 overs is complete, their bowlers will bowl across the seam to hasten the process of roughing up the ball that, in turn, hastens the arrival of reverse swing.
November 8, 2008
Something seems broken in Dravid
Posted on 11/08/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Peter Roebuck is surprised that Rahul Dravid's lean patch has extended for so long and points out two faults: a) his strokes seem to have lost power and b) his front foot is moving laterally instead of forwards. Read on in the Hindu.
Dravid’s famous wall was built with cement not dust. As a rule, too, heavy batsmen fall back before those light on their legs. They start to lumber, arrive a fraction late to play their shots and make a mistake. Dravid is as light as a dancer. His footwork and reflexes ought to be unchanged from his days of clover.
Selectors no longer fishing with dynamite
Posted on 11/08/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Alex Brown writes in the Sydney Morning Herald that Australia’s selectors must be held accountable for their decisions.
With the possible exception of Vatican City missionaries and Peter Sterling's barber, Australian selectors have held down the cushiest posts of the past decade. A superstar line-up, coupled with mediocre international competition, left the panel with little to do but maintain the status quo and watch as the Australian cricket juggernaut vanquished all before them. Fishing with dynamite, you might say.
Those days are gone. Retirements and injuries to key personnel have greatly eroded the Australian team, placing increased focus on selections. And while the selectors were initially praised for the manner in which they drip-fed the likes of Phil Jaques, Brad Haddin, Mitchell Johnson and Beau Casson into the Test side, the same panel must stand accountable for the untried and unbalanced squad it sent to India - one that requires a major reversal of fortune if it is to retain the Border-Gavaskar Trophy.
In the same paper, Brown speaks to speaks to six coaches of Test nations to find out how they view Australia’s decline. Here’s a sample of what John Dyson, the West Indies coach, has to say.
I think everyone has begun to realise that this current Australian side is human and can be beaten. And that's good for cricket. I remember playing against the West Indies in the mid-1980s, and once the rest of the world realised they were beatable, it ushered in a good period for the game. I think the same is happening here.
Once rejected Krejza spins miracles
Posted on 11/08/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Peter Roebuck, in the Age, looks at the remarkable achievement of Jason Krejza in capturing eight wickets on Test debut.
With the possible exception of family members, did any Australian seriously expect Jason Krejza to take a swag of wickets? Australia has been struggling for wickets all campaign and suddenly one bloke took eight in one fell swoop. In a trice, he has become the team's second-highest wicket-taker on tour. Good on 'im. He has a big heart.
Krejza was amazing. His head could easily have dropped as he was repeatedly ignored in the last few weeks. Everyone capable of sending down a spinner of any description was preferred to him. Players were flown in from Melbourne, the ball was tossed to occasional colleagues and still he was not given his chance. At one stage, he looked about as likely to get a go as the manager's wife.
November 7, 2008
Shane Warne's spectre lingers over Australia
Posted on 11/07/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
The decline in Australia’s cricketing fortunes in India, the ‘defensive’ nature of their game, and their weakened spin attack, has affected the enthusiasm of their supporters for the sport, writes Alan Lee in the Times. He attributes the retirement of Shane Warne as a decisive factor for the current situation, and laments the withering away of the “leg spin revolution” he wrought.
Shane Warne is a different matter. It is not only the absence of the man himself that is mourned but the non-appearance of the promised generation of Warne wannabes. Where are all the young wrist spinners with surfer haircuts that seemed certain to queue to replace their hero? The leg-spinning revolution was a romantic notion and should have been a fitting legacy, but it has withered on the vine.
November 6, 2008
Australia's attack splitting at the seams
Posted on 11/06/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Robert Craddock writes in the Daily Telegraph that the struggles of Brett Lee and Stuart Clark on the India tour could have more long-term consequences than some people anticipate.
It was assumed Stuart Clark and Brett Lee would be around to carry Australia's attack into the 2009 Ashes tour and beyond. They were earmarked as anchormen of the next generation. But life can change quickly when your team fades at the seams. Days become longer, the workload more taxing. The body feels five years older than it is.
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Jason Gillespie went from being a rampaging force in India in October, 2004, to cannon fodder in England 10 months later. Gillespie was gone at 31. Paul Reiffel went at 32, as did Merv Hughes. Craig McDermott was gone, through injury, at 31. Australia's expectations about the longevity of their quicks may have been unduly inflated by the stunning durability of Glenn McGrath, who left at 37. But he was a one-off.
In the Age, Peter Roebuck looks at how Jason Krejza fought back from an early pasting on his first day of Test cricket.
To his credit, Ponting kept his spinner going. Although it was not much of a consolation, at least the batsmen were hitting the ball in the air. Nevertheless, the new man's breakers seemed too gentle to worry established batsmen. Spinners need to have as much snap, crackle and pop as Rice Bubbles. Krejza does not so much rip his off breaks as release them, does not so much flight them as float them. But he persisted, and had the sense to change his line so that the ball turned back towards the off bail. Also, he pushed the ball through a little faster so that opponents could not so confidently step out or back.
November 5, 2008
Following on
Posted on 11/05/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Australia will end their glorious reign as the No. 1 team in Test cricket if they were to lose in Nagpur. Heralding a new era, Lawrence Booth in his blog on the Wisden Cricketer website believes Sri Lanka are the most likely to pick up the baton, though India may be the conventional favourite, as he takes a look at the possible successors.
Sri Lanka's nucleus of top players may be small, but it is unrivalled in its quality: Kumar Sangakkara and Mahela Jayawardene score most of their runs; Muttiah Muralitharan and Ajantha Mendis take most of their wickets. So what a shame it is that Sri Lanka’s next scheduled Test match was May in England, a tour that will almost certainly not now take place.
M Vijay- deserving the chance
Posted on 11/05/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
S.Dinakar, writing in the Hindu, believes M Vijay, who's been included in the Indian squad for the Nagpur Test, has the right ingredients to play the role of an opener on the bigger stage.
Importantly, he can ‘play’ and ‘leave’; a vital attribute in an opener while coping with the new ball. Vijay’s balanced stance and an initial, but non-committal, trigger movement forward enhances his judgement in the corridor.
Talent, performances and a combination of circumstances have earned Vijay a place in the Indian squad for the high-stakes final Test against Australia at Nagpur. He deserves the opportunity.
Australia's style of cricket brings out the best in me
Posted on 11/05/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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Laxman: "'Those early failures gave me a lot of insight into my character".
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VVS Laxman, in the lead-up to his 100th Test, speaks of the highlights and disappointments of his career in an interview with Ajay Naidu in the Times of India.
The first four years, I was opening the innings and after a couple of chances people would call me a non-regular opener and I would be dropped. To be honest, those early failures gave me a lot of insight into my character. It made me tough and it gave me the confidence to be able to bounce back from any setback.
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They've (Australia) been top class with their batting, bowling and fielding and for me it started with the under-19 series. They are very aggressive and they don't give you an inch. Their style of cricket brings out the best in me.
November 4, 2008
Dravid's batting needs 'urgent maintenance work'
Posted on 11/04/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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Rahul Dravid averages 32.95 this year, his lowest in a calendar year
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Shashank Shekhar, in the Times of India, writes that Rahul Dravid requires some "urgent maintenance work" following the slide in his batting form since he resigned from captaincy. His performance in the Delhi Test, where he was dismissed in ways inconsistent with his technical correctness, is indicative of his failure to counter some new problems that have crept up in his game, Shekhar feels.
Dravid’s loss of touch is strange because in cricket it’s generally believed that technically sound batsmen have a better chance of coming out of form slumps than those who rely on individual skill and flair. But Dravid’s blues have stretched a bit too far for his own comfort. But it clearly has more than just a technical facet to it. When Dravid relinquished captaincy, it was well understood that the decision was a direct fallout of the stress he was carrying. To add to his woes, this unseemly debate over the place of seniors in the team came at a very inopportune time for him, when he was fighting his own battles.
Meanwhile, Harsha Bhogle, in the same newspaper, writes that Mahendra Singh Dhoni, India's new captain, must back Rahul Dravid to the hilt, given the pressure on him to deliver in Nagpur.
A champion fades away
Posted on 11/04/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Adding to the numerous tributes to Anil Kumble following his retirement, an editorial comment in the Hindu emphasises Kumble's contribution to India's success overseas in the recent years, and how he demolished the myth about his ineffectiveness away from home.
The Bangalorean leaves behind a unique legacy. He has bowled India to wins in Australia, England, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and the West Indies, demolishing the myth that he was dangerous only at home. During the fractious tour of Australia, India gained from his clear-sighted leadership; in fact, he might be the best captain India almost never had. In the final analysis, Kumble leaves Indian cricket immeasurably better than he found it when he made his Test debut in 1990.
An opinion piece in Daily News and Analysis singles out Kumble's statesmanship in India's acrimonious Test series in Australia earlier this year as his greatest achievement. With India's 'old guard' gradually disbanding, the article does hint at some apprehension towards a "newer, brasher India" replacing the gentleman-like demeanour that Kumble exemplified.
Kumble’s greatest achievement, however, could be the statesmanlike quality that he brought to the field during the last Indian series in Australia which was fraught with tensions between the two teams. As accusations flew through the air, Kumble rose above it and took his team with him
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But this is still an occasion that must be marked, and that is why the sporting world has stood up to salute Kumble. He represents the best of a sport that is often lauded for being a “gentleman’s game” — in spite of enough evidence to the contrary — because he is a gentleman. Now, the newer, brasher India takes over.
An editorial comment in the Business Standard lauds Kumble for starting and sustaining the "golden era" of spin bowling along with Shane Warne and Muttiah Muralitharan, at a time when spin bowlers, particularly of the wrist variety, were relegated to the margins by fast bowlers.
November 3, 2008
Kumble: A hard act to follow
Posted on 11/03/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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'Cheers': Kumble calls time at the Kotla, the venue where he picked up all ten in a Test innings
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Anil Kumble was determined to leave behind a legacy for future cricketers and captains and the team Dhoni will lead starting from Nagpur owes Kumble for its unity, writes Kadambari Murali in the Hindustan Times. She also recounts a meeting with Kumble in his Bangalore home eight months ago.
Eight months ago, sitting under a lovely afternoon sun outside Kreeda, his elegant Bangalore bungalow, Anil Kumble casually said he didn’t think he would last out the year, career wise. “I’m hoping to make it to the Australian series this October,” he added, equally casually, “but it depends on my body”. That Bangalore day, he grinned as wife Chethana disapprovingly commented, “He needs to think about himself”. “She’s being a wife,” he quipped, smiling at the woman he dubbed his “support system” and “partner in everything”.
Harsha Bhogle, in his tribute in the Indian Express, says the the retirement announcement itself was typical of the man: no grandstanding, no ostentation, no farewell tour. Anything else would have jarred, it wouldn’t have been Kumble. He changed the perception of spin bowling, suggesting a variation from the established pillars of guile, spin and turn.
Bowling with a fractured jaw in Antigua was the most visible expression of his commitment. But it wasn’t unexpected. Sourav Ganguly once said that if the opposition was 250 for 1 and he was looking around the field, there was one man who was looking straight back at him because he wanted the ball.
In the Independent, Angus Fraser hopes Kumble is not lost to cricket and that the BCCI use him to get a better perspective of what is good for the future of the game.
Throughout Anil Kumble has retained his dignity, it has been an immense contribution, and he did not outstay his welcome by a single day. Even in his retirement he served the side and Indian cricket, writes Peter Roebuck in the Sydney Morning Herald.
He must have yearned for one last victory and, best of all, a series win against the Australians. It was not to be. Always something is left on the table. Cricket is like that, not exactly cruel but not sentimental either. Kumble worked hard in the first innings and must have been happy with his game. But 22 yards away it did not happen. The ball flatly refused to skip or skid or bounce or turn sharply. Instead, it meandered through, giving batsmen a precious second to adjust their strokes. Previously, Kumble only needed one victory for a wicket. He bowled straight, attacked the stumps and preyed upon error. Now opponents could escape his clutches.
Rarely has there been a sportsman who has combined flintiness and dignity so adeptly. He was hard, really hard, but utterly fair. Kumble forever walked the line, but rarely if ever crossed it, write Rob Smyth in the Guardian.
And so he went. Not at the end of the series, or the end of the year, but now, when the arguments for his going were only as strong as, not stronger than, those for his continuing—and that, perhaps more than anything he has done on the field in course of an extraordinarily distinguished 19-year career, sums up all there is to know about Kumble the human being, writes Prem Panicker on his blog Smoke Signals.
G Rajaraman has known Kumble from the time he was known as K Anil and played under-19 cricket for Karnataka. He offers a few snippets of a wonderful human being and a great friend in his column in Cricketnirvana.com.
In Daily News and Analysis, Dilip Vengsarkar salutes Kumble for his attitude and the fact that he ensured the game was played in true spirit, without crossing that fine line even once.
In the Deccan Chronicle, R Mohan says Kumble was too refined a person to think negatively of anyone.
November 2, 2008
India have Australia by the googlies
Posted on 11/02/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Kerry O'Keeffe knows a thing or two about slow bowling and in his column in the Sunday Telegraph he lets fly at Australia's selectors for their spin decisions. He says India's batsmen have Australia by the googlies.
Last Wednesday, Australia began a crucial Test in Delhi needing to take 20 wickets to level the series. Our panel came up with the slow bowling trio of Cameron White, Michael Clarke and Simon Katich. This grouping is unlikely to take 20 first-class wickets in a calendar year on doctored decks in the Gobi Desert.
Is Jason Krejza sleeping inside the Taj Mahal with Stuart MacGill's alarm clock? And why is baby-faced chinaman Beau Casson considered fruit out of season? Casson's situation demands a public explanation from selection chairman Andrew Hilditch, who the media feel is harder to catch than the multiple top edges he provided fine leg during his hooking days.
O'Keeffe knows that Casson might not be the answer but he believes the bowler at least deserved a chance after making his Test debut in Barbados.
Casson has to develop his momentum on slow pitches where batsmen tend to play him a little too comfortably off the back foot. These are challenges he has been denied by selection panel perceptions. Perhaps Casson's googlies will return against New Zealand this month in Australia. The Kiwis would have trouble picking Bill Lawry's nose.
November 1, 2008
Red and yellow cards for cricket?
Posted on 11/01/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
An editorial in the Indian Express criticises the recent generation of Indian cricketers for showing poor conduct in the field, especially after the punishments meted out to Gautam Gambhir and Zaheer Khan. The papers suggests soccer-style reprimands to set the players right.
India are a team enamoured of aggression but don’t know how to express it any more. They should learn from the Australians, who keep it mean but seldom dirty. And when one of their performers loses the plot, as Andrew Symonds did, they sort him out. The Indians, in contrast, are too secure in the belief that were they to be reprimanded, a chatter of racism-in-cricket would protect them. The Indian board must wise up to this.
October 31, 2008
Looking the part
Posted on 10/31/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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Matthew Hayden sought command without trying to take command
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The Australian batsmen were determined to undo their previous performance at Mohali and cast aside the excesses to get back the tempo they had been missing in the earlier matches on the third day in Delhi. Peter Roebuck in the Age doffs his hat to the way they applied their best games.
Batting itself is a constant examination, and Hayden has nothing to prove. He could retire tomorrow safe in the knowledge that he has given outstanding service. History is likely to regard him as among the most imposing opening batsmen to represent the wide brown land. But he is not ready to be put to pasture; he reckons that at 37, a late starter such as him has a few more campaigns left in him.
While Hayden has found some form, Australia's fast bowlers are still looking for reverse swing. On the Cricket Australia website, the bowling coach Troy Cooley explains the art.
Double trouble
Posted on 10/31/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
VVS Laxman and Gautam Gambhir scored double-centuries for India on day two of the third Test against Australia in Delhi. Harsha Bhogle writes on the two batsmen:
In the Indian Express Of Laxman he writes that there is something deeply satisfying about a man who doesn’t thump his own chest, doesn’t give the two fingers to the opposition, is in the news for the right reasons and doesn’t know what a brawl means.
In the Times of India Bhogle says Gambhir played according to the situation.
When the situation warranted solidity, Gambhir offered it, when Tendulkar was looking good, he provided security and after tea he burst forth with strokes of great pedigree, more than doubling his score. And as the first day drew to a close, he played for the morrow showing what a good team man he is; the opening batsman was ready to take the new ball for his team on Day 2.
October 29, 2008
How long before Twenty20 takes over?
Posted on 10/29/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Picture this. The biggest run machine of our age poised to take guard against one of the fastest bowlers the world's ever known. A contest between two teams that have gone toe-to-toe for the best part of a decade, in a rivalry that has seen everything from remarkable comebacks and hat-tricks to allegations of racism and boorishness. Pencil in, too, a partisan crowd packed to the rafters, baying for blood as the visitors' premier bowler sprints in off his Mercedes-smooth run-up.
Sadly, one part of the picture was sorely missing on the first day of the India-Australia Test at the Feroz Shah Kotla, blogs Dileep Premachandran on the Guardian website.
The crowd roared and the Indian tricolour waved, but vast swathes of green, blue, red and orange seats were empty, shimmering brightly in the afternoon sun. If you needed a statement about Test cricket's health, you couldn't have got a more damning one. Only about 20,000 had braved the trek past the many security checks to get inside a stadium that now seats 45,000. Many might have been in bad shape after the Diwali revelries the night before, but in a city of millions you certainly expected better for a match-up that is now Test cricket's heavyweight clash.
Majestic Tendulkar
Posted on 10/29/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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It was vintage Tendulkar at the Feroz Shah Kotla
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Peter Roebuck in the Sydney Morning Herald says Sachin Tendulkar's hard work during practice showed on the first day of the third Test against Australia at the Feroz Shah Kotla in Delhi.
Before the Delhi Test, Sachin Tendulkar spent hours in the nets facing a shaved and taped tennis ball fired at him by the coach. Concerned about his technique against swinging and rising deliveries, and aware that the pitch was likely to be faster than forecast, he wanted to be prepared. To that end, he ironed out the kinks that had crept into his game. Twice he had lost his wicket to loose strokes and once to an outswinger. It was not good enough.
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Tendulkar was majestic. Indeed, he has seldom batted better. Called to the crease after Rahul Dravid had indulged in an indiscretion that imperils his position, Tendulkar swiftly settled into his work. Immediately, it was obvious that his mind was alert and his feet were moving quickly into position. As usual, he broke his duck with a neat tuck to leg. Lots of players can improvise on the front foot but none are as creative as the Indian when stepping back. Several times he retreated, examined the ball and, finding nothing untoward, directed it into a gap. Often he was happy to take a single, a currency he has never undervalued. Now and then he pressed for more, once leaning back to guide the ball over the slips, a daring offering previously reserved for one-day matches. It was an astonishing stroke to play on the first morning of a vital Test, and a bad sign for the visitors.
At times you could have fooled yourself into thinking that it was the irrepressible teenager of Perth 1992 vintage batting, and not the 35-year-old veteran who was supposed to be on his last legs. Click here to read more on Tendulkar's innings.
October 28, 2008
Harbhajan will be desperate to face favourite foe
Posted on 10/28/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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A sore toe puts Harbhajan in doubt for the third Test at the Feroz Shah Kotla in Delhi
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Harbhajan Singh will be desperate to play in the third Test in Delhi. Nursing a sore toe, he may be hampered but will not want to miss the chance to lower the Australian colours, writes Peter Roebuck in the Age.
A dry pitch has been prepared, besides which the dreaded "Bhaji" is not scared of the Australians and never has been. After all he took 30 wickets against them in their first meeting in 2001. The sight of an Australian cricketer sparks something in him, a mixture of competitive fervour and national pride. He tells friends that he does not like the way the Australian team walks about like it's the best thing since buttered naan. Asked to name his favourite Australian players he mentions Steve Waugh and Glenn McGrath and then grinds to a halt. Adam Gilchrist is dismissed as a "sweet knife".
Graceless gibberish
Posted on 10/28/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Patrick Smith takes a dig at the Australians after their capitulation in Mohali. He believes Australia are in denial. Read his piece in the Australian.
Hayden, who has made 0, 13, 0, and 29, has said that he believes he has Zaheer Khan on the back foot. For the record the Australian opener has made 17 fewer runs than Zaheer...Hayden's diagnosis that Zaheer is on the point of a nervous breakdown is based on the bowler's abuse of him when the Australian was dismissed for 29 in the second innings of the second Test. Hayden apparently had brought Zaheer to this brink when he charged his first ball of the second innings. That the ball was mis-hit and looped dangerously close to mid-off was, it seems, a victory for Hayden and not the bowler.
Said Hayden: "Zaheer Khan has been put under pressure a lot by myself and Gilly (Adam Gilchrist) in all the tournaments we've played in one-dayers. I have also tried to emulate that when we've played Tests. I just feel he is vulnerable when he's like that."
Not only is it such graceless gibberish, it is also foolish.
The need for attractive Test cricket
Posted on 10/28/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
At a time when Test cricket's fortunes are at a low ebb, with the threat from the various Twenty20 tournaments around the world, it is necessary for the two most attractive sides (Australia and India) in the world to play out close finishes and exciting sessions to help traditional fans retain their faith as well as to attract a new set which cannot look beyond a 20-over match, writes Suresh Menon on ESPNStar.
The current series, unfortunately, has been too much about failing individuals and not enough about the big picture. You don't need great players to play great cricket; perhaps the rival captains should have a chat before the third Test and work out how they can make their sport more attractive, where victory and defeat are merely by-products of five days of intense, hard-fought but appealing cricket. Test cricket is on trial, and if it fails to excite the public even in India, the spiritual home of the game, then the trial can go only one way.
Ponting must learn to play the hand he's been dealt
Posted on 10/28/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Other captains are used to making the most of limited resources. Now it is Ricky Ponting's turn. It is also his greatest test, writes Peter Roebuck in the Sydney Morning Herald.
The days of domination are over. That was the message out of the Mohali Test match. Not that Australia cannot win matches and even retain a high position in the rankings, but the era of crushing all and sundry has passed. Quite simply, the Australian bowling is not strong enough to run through proficient batting orders. Hereafter, it will be a struggle, with tight series, long Test matches and captains constantly under pressure. It is not an easy adjustment to make. The West Indies did not survive it. Inflated players continued strutting around long after the wins had dried up. Australia must not allow its cricket culture to weaken.
It says much about the state of Australian cricket that barely a year after the retirement of the greatest spinner in history, the nation is clamouring for an emergency call-up for a bowler who has spun out just a dozen batsmen at Test level, writes John Townsend in the Independent.
The refusal of Cricket Australia to consider selecting Symonds, referring to mysterious "medical and related issues", has polarised the country. Newspapers and talk radio have been filled to the hyperbolic brim with debate on the issue, with Tom Moody, the West Australian coach and recent Sri Lankan boss, speaking for many fans this week when he argued: "Australia must send an immediate SOS to Andrew Symonds if they want to pick their best team. India is the toughest place in world cricket to come from behind and when the Australian team is struggling for balance, form and cohesion, we simply can't afford to leave him out."
October 27, 2008
Reverse sting
Posted on 10/27/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
That Indian pace should blast the Aussies off their pedestal seems to be sweet irony, writes Rohit Mahajan in Outlook. Assessing a few dismissals from the first two Tests and speaking to members of the Australian support staff as well as Peter Roebuck, the columnist, Mahajan notes that with hostile spells on unhelpful tracks, India's fast bowlers have initiated reverse swing when conventional movement was hard to come by in the first place.
A TV grab of the state of the balls after an equal number of overs bowled by both teams proved the Indians have the art of keeping the shine on one side of the ball, the Australians lack it. No wonder some Aussie batsmen looked like outdated spare parts on the crease. "We got the ball to swing, especially reverse-swing when it was nice and hard," Dhoni said. "We pitched it in the right areas, and the spinners also bowled well.
October 25, 2008
Super talent waiting in the wings
Posted on 10/25/2008 in Indian cricket
India is the real deal and Mohali was no fluke, says Darren Berry in the Sunday Age.
Sourav Ganguly has done well to claw his way back into the team after a bitter falling out under the Greg Chappell regime. Ganguly may not be popular in Australia, but he is treated like a prince in India, loved and respected by the masses. He has announced that this is his last series and I wouldn't be surprised if V. V. S Laxman is heading down the same path. Rahul Dravid and the master, Sachin Tendulkar, are rapidly approaching the end as well. India must stagger their departures to avoid a mass exodus.
The frightening thing for world cricket is that India has some super talent - with both bat and ball - waiting in the wings. Make no mistake, the Board of Control for Cricket in India is the most powerful body in world cricket and its introduction of the hugely successful Indian Premier League earlier this year was a masterstroke. Not only was it a monumental financial windfall but, even more importantly, it exposed and unearthed young talent, albeit in the Twenty20 version of the game.
The new tall order
Posted on 10/25/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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Ishant Sharma: Full speed ahead
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He is 192 centimetres and growing, accurate, menacing, creative and captivating, and he didn't shy away from chewing Glenn McGrath's during the inaugural IPL this year. For Ishant Sharma, writes Chloe Saltau in the Sunday Age, this series could well be what Australia's 1995 tour of the West Indies was for McGrath. And a bit more.
Two more Tests will tell whether there is a new world order in cricket, but it is already beyond dispute that India possesses the most exciting young fast bowler in the world. He comes from a working class family in Delhi - and still lives in the modest neighbourhood where he grew up despite his sudden wealth - and a country that has broken the hearts of many a paceman with its flat, spin-friendly wickets.
To top it off, Ishant's got Jason Gillespie all jealous.
In the Indian Express, Sandeep Dwivedi traces trace the making of India’s new pace hope.
Several years ago, the cricketers of Ganga International School in Delhi couldn’t understand their coach Shravan Kumar’s obsession with a recently-drafted, tall, gawky pacer. As the whispering campaign against the erratic bowler with a no-ball problem and a stop-start run-up grew louder, Shravan would often get to hear, “Sir has picked him again!” But despite this small resistance, the coach would have an all-knowing smile as he threw the new ball to his pet without a hint of guilt.
Little did the Ganga International boys know that one day they would be flaunting their proximity to that unwanted member of their team. The beanpole-framed bowler has now made a mark in world cricket, and his early colleagues end up dropping his name to spice up stories about their modest initial cricketing days.
Mishra's journey to the Indian side
Posted on 10/25/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Before his call-up to the Indian side, legspinner Amit Mishra, who took seven wickets on Test debut, faced a lot of disappointments and nearly gave up the game. He talks to the Hindustan Times' Varun Gupta about being rejected by the Delhi selectors and his move to Haryana.
Amit Mishra, who had taken wickets by the hatful in local and trial matches, not only did not make the shortlist, he was also told by Delhi selectors that he was surplus to requirements and did not have enough talent. Specific reasons weren’t given, except a point was made. It was suggested he “work on his weight if he wanted to play oonchi (top) cricket”... That Kotla day, he decided to pack his bags, leave the city of his birth and move to Haryana.
And till that unexpected debut at the second India-Australia Test at Mohali, struggle was his glory, perseverance and indefatigability his allies, and shadows his home. Twice he came within a whisker of breaking down and quitting the game. And yet he couldn't, for as he said, he didn't know what he could do with those wrists and fingers other than tweak the ball. The last time he went into a depression was in 2005, when a shoulder injury curbed his potency.
In the Hindu WV Raman writes that though Mishra's emergence has provided relief, he must give way to Anil Kumble if the latter is fit for the next Test.
October 24, 2008
The boot is on the other foot
Posted on 10/24/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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Can Ricky Ponting and his boys bounce back?
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Apparently, Warren Buffett is buying equities. Whether the "Sage of Omaha" would be game enough to buy shares in this Australian side is anyone's guess, writes Peter Roebuck in the Sydney Morning Herald. However, the futures prospects of the Indian team don't seem as bleak, at least for the next Test in Delhi.
Everyone is going to fancy a piece of them. Trouncing the Aussies did not look that hard. Previously, it has taken towering performances to bring them down. England took three years to prepare for the 2005 Ashes and another three to recover. Even so, Glenn McGrath did not play in a losing side in that series India won in 2001 but Shane Warne was half-fit besides while Rahul Dravid and V.V.S. Laxman built a miraculous partnership, and some of the umpiring at Eden Gardens was dodgy.
Now the boot is on the other foot. Now the heavyweights are in the opposing camp. Virender Sehwag did not appear in any of the defeats in the recent series Down Under. Nor did his opening partner Gautam Gambhir. The conclusion is unavoidable. When both sides are a full strength, and all other things being equal, India have the edge. And, on the evidence seen in Mohali, not only India. Australia had nothing to grizzle about, not homemade pitches or dubious decisions or queasy stomachs or absentees. Ricky Ponting and his players were beaten fair and square, and by the length of the straight
How will the team's performance affect viewership figures in Australia? Philip Derriman finds out.
Bouncer-sized blokes wearing stolen headgear?
Posted on 10/24/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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Will Brett Lee be able the swing the SG ball like Zaheer Khan?
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After Mohali, India is somewhat bewildered: is this the world’s No.1 team or some other bouncer-sized blokes wearing stolen headgear?, writes Sharda Ugra in India Today. Things have surely not gone according the type, she says.
Before a ball was bowled, it was Virender Sehwag, rather than any arriving Aussie, who forecast the result: “Either 3-1 or 3-0 to India.” Bangalore Man of the Match Zaheer Khan heckled the Aussies for not scoring quickly and being unable to take 20 wickets. In Mohali, Dhoni asked first slip Rahul Dravid to check out the scoreboard: Australia 22 off 13 overs.
At that moment, an on-field landing of Martians in a flying saucer would have caused less shock. In their four innings in India, Australia have scored their runs at 2.86, 3.12, 2.63 and 3.10 per over, this when their batting is the stronger and more experienced component of their team.
Usually meticulous planners, Australia appear surprised that the Indian SG Test ball acts differently from their familiar Kookaburra and does not do as they want it to, but turns into a stump-seeking missile in Indian hands.
In another article, the magazine says "Australia must do an India, must do what was done to them in 2001: return from the dead."
The King is not yet dead
Posted on 10/24/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Harsha Bhogle, in the Indian Express, feels it's too premature to write Australia off on the basis of one heavy defeat. He writes that great teams like Australia tend to question their self belief, analyse themselves relentlessly, identify weaknesses and seek to plug them. The mindset of the new crop of players might just be different compared to those who made their debuts in 1999, at the start of Australia's dream run.
Should they lose the series there, a crop of inexperienced players, the future of Australian cricket, will be made aware of the fact that they o can lose. To an earlier generation, Brett Lee and Adam Gilchrist for example, the initiation years only saw victory. They grew quickly, learnt to win and kept the Aussie juggernaut going. Now if the Johnsons and Whites and Haddins begin their careers with defeat, their mindset will be different. It is there that Australia’s greatest challenge lies.
In the Hindu, Makarand Waingankar attributes India's victory to Mahendra Singh Dhoni's aggressive body language in the field, right from the time he spoke at the toss.
The strategy was clear; if you win the toss, bat for a minimum of five sessions and put the opposition under pressure. Verbal reassurance from the captain acts like a tonic to his players. Not sure what tactic Dhoni uses in the dressing room when he is the captain, one is inclined to believe that he certainly has definite roles for each player.
What really happened with Lee and Ponting
Posted on 10/24/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
In the Australian, Ricky Ponting explains just what happened between him and Brett Lee in Mohali.
What Brett couldn't understand is that Mitchell Johnson and Peter Siddle had the chance to bowl before him. But by the time I wanted to bowl Brett, we were five overs behind on our over rate. If he were to come on and we went six or seven overs down then I could be suspended under the ICC playing conditions for slow over rates.
Once we had a chance to talk it through he was fine with it. He said to me at the lunch break, "I'm a bowler, I want to bowl, and you're a batsman, you want to bat". But there are other things I have to think about on the field as well. We talk about over rates at every team meeting. We get behind and I'm forced to bowl guys I sometimes don't want to bowl in the circumstances.
Better off without Warne
Posted on 10/24/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Malcolm Conn writes in the Australian that as much as Australia would like to have Shane Warne bowling for them in India, the team itself is more unified without him.
Ponting is gun-barrel straight, has a tremendous work ethic and desire for success he expects other to share, and has no political agendas. That's why he and Lee have no lingering issues in the way Warne used to take them into the dressing room and on to the field. When Taylor struggled during the 1996-97 summer Warne was the first to begin muttering "How's Tubby's form?"
There was almost a mutiny during the South African tour that followed when Ian Healy and Steve Waugh lined up for the one-day captaincy as Taylor's form slump continued. And Warne, miffed at missing out on the captaincy when Taylor retired, made no attempt to hide his disdain for Waugh during the difficult early stages of the 1999 World Cup.
Waugh had dropped Warne in the West Indies earlier that year because he had not fully recovered from a shoulder operation, and Warne never forgave him. "How's Tugga going," Warne would repeat on the field as Australia struggled at the start of the 1999 World Cup. "How's Tugga going." There is no mutiny in the current Australian side, just a lot of soul-searching after last Tuesday's thumping 320-run loss.
October 23, 2008
Mohali and after
Posted on 10/23/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
India's crushing win against Australia in the second Test at Mohali has certainly spiced up issues related to both teams.
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The heat is on: Ricky Ponting
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The last time Ponting was under sustained pressure as a captain was during the 2005 Ashes. A senior player on the tour confided that after the Edgbaston Test, the Australians had resigned to defeat -- hardly a ringing endorsement of Ponting’s ability to inspire, just as his tirade at Duncan Fletcher at Trent Bridge spoke volumes for his default position under stress. Lawrence Booth in his blog in the Wisden Cricketer says doubts have risen again over the Australian captain's man-management skills after the Australian media's treatment of Ponting’s run-in with Brett Lee at Mohali.
A captain is only as good as the bowlers at his disposal, which is a truth Ponting may only just be discovering. But a good captain will also make the most of his resources and by gifting India’s openers singles all round the ground on the third evening – a policy that allowed Virender Sehwag and Gautam Gambhir to put on 100 in 23 overs before stumps – Ponting got it badly wrong.
On the other side, Prem Panicker in his blog believes that it is up to Anil Kumble to judge his match-fitness of his shoulder, confidence level, reading of the Kotla pitch and the selection strategies that need to be employed to keep India in front and, if possible, nail the series before heading into the final Test.
He will make that decision in the next few days, and in course of the Kotla Test, he will be proved right or wrong. But whatever the outcome of that trial—he could get you a ten for, or go wicketless, and either situation will provide grist for ‘I told you sos’—it is fair to suggest that his decision would have been taken in all honesty. He has never, in all these years, given you reason to think otherwise.
Every successful 'leggie' carries a sense of mystique around, and Amit Mishra, though still a novice is already showing the craft and charisma that could make him a star. Simon Briggs in the Telegraph is excited about Mishra's arrival on the international scene after his flying start in Mohali.
October 22, 2008
No need to panic
Posted on 10/22/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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The role of Ricky Ponting and Michael Clarke as leaders will be tested
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No need to sharpen the guillotine or write off any players just yet, writes Shane Warne after Australia's 320-run loss to India in Mohali. Experienced players will have to play a vital role during the break ahead of the third Test in Delhi, he says in the Daily Telegraph.
Mohali's gone, deal with it. Say well played and carry yourself well, hold your head high. But deep down use it as motivation and keep that hunger that's inside alive.
Be the man to drag the team along and in the right direction, be prepared for whatever the opposition throws at you, fight and never give up, don't be afraid and start thinking negatives and what ifs. No doubts, or you just start hoping that someone does something, you go into your shell and start looking after your own backside and forget the team.
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This is where experience and calm heads rise to the top, and Ponting and Clarke as leaders will become crucial, sitting around over a glass and chewing the fat with the team and coming up with some new plans. Talking tactics as a group is important.
Passing the baton to Dhoni
Posted on 10/22/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Mahendra Singh Dhoni may have done enough in his two Tests as captain to prove that he's the right man to take over the job full time, but the man he will have to thank for shaping the team is Anil Kumble, writes Anand Vasu in the Hindustan Times. If Dhoni's brand is synonymous with exuberance and youth, Kumble injected the team with steel, dignity and belief, the focal point being in Australia when allegations of racism flew almost as thick and fast as outside edges.
For once, the Indian captaincy is not a poisoned chalice, this time around, the question of succession has not raised controversy, conflict, challengers, even eyebrows. Other than the sheer joy of lording it over Australia, this Test should always be remembered for this: An Indian captain will not be staying longer than he was popular, and the successor will not have to wait any longer than necessary.
In the same paper, Kumble makes his observations on India's biggest victory in terms of runs. Forced to watch the game from the dressing room, he gushes at Amit Mishra's five-wicket haul on debut and earmarks him as one for the future.
He showed no nerves at all and was absolutely in control from ball one. He used his variations very nicely: The way he came around and bowled a wrong 'un at Clarke showed that he's a thinking cricketer. With an eye to the future, it also augurs well for India that we've found someone like Amit. An orthodox bowler, he spins the ball a lot, uses his flight very nicely and frankly, it was great watching him. I can tell you that this would have given him a lot of confidence. The first five-for I got told me that if I could get one, I could get more.
October 21, 2008
Australia's Waterloo
Posted on 10/21/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Greg Baum writes in the Age that Australia have had a few false Waterloos over the years, but this one has a distinctly Napoleonic feel about it.
Now, the tour that resonates loudly is 1998. India won the first two Tests by massive margins, then lost the dead rubber. Sachin Tendulkar was in his pomp; he was virtually undismissable. Glenn McGrath did not tour, Steve Waugh injured himself, Warne took 10 wickets in three Tests, but at a high price; he was exhausted. Seamers Paul Wilson and Adam Dale, and off-spinner Gavin Robertson, all appeared for Australia, workaday cricketers who between them would play only two other Tests after this series. It was no contest.
Mike Selvey, writing in the Guardian, agrees with Baum, as does Andy Bull in the same paper, but Patrick Kidd, in his Line and Length blog in the Times, says the Mohali loss is more a blip than a terminal decline.
In the Age, Peter Hanlon makes some observations about the Mohali Test.
Australia was the best team in the world until all of those bloody Victorians got a game.
How come Zaheer Khan and Ishant Sharma get more movement off the pitch than our spinners - at 140 km/h?
Gee, that caught-behind the umpire turned down when India was 400 in front really hurt us.
On the BBC website, Nick Bryant says, "it's the manner of the defeat that has the Aussie cricket cognoscenti worried, because it laid bare the weaknesses and gaps in the once-feared team."
Ponting must call on AB for advice
Posted on 10/21/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Robert Craddock in the Daily Telegraph suggests that Ricky Ponting desperately needs a meeting with Allan Border to work out a battle-plan for the cricketing recession Australia had to have.
Border is the man with the plan to handle it because he went through that and much more in the 1980s. Losing a Test is a big drama for Australia these days. Border had such a weak team in the 1980s they went three years without winning a series.
He knows all about fast bowlers with confidence problems, players being rushed into sides before they are ready and players trying to live up to impossible expectations after the retirements of Greg Chappell, Dennis Lillee and Rod Marsh.
In the Courier-Mail, Craddock speaks to another former captain, Kim Hughes, about the challenges facing Ponting.
If there is one line of advice you would give Ponting what would it be?
They have an old saying in Madras ... to lose patience is to lose the battle. That's what he needs to remember. And that incidents like the one with Brett Lee might have been glossed over a few years ago when the team was going well. But they will be big headlines now that the tide has turned. And where once there was stability now there will be a steady flow of players in and out of the team. But I have a lot of confidence in Ponting. He will handle it.
Outbatted, outbowled, outcaptained
Posted on 10/21/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
It was not the defeat that was significant, but its manner. Australia have lost before but it's been a long time since they were so comprehensively taken apart. Throughout the fourth innings of a one-sided contest, Indian supporters waited for the feared fightback - but it never came," writes Peter Roebuck in the Sydney Morning Herald.
India might as well have been playing on a different pitch and with a different ball. It was not just the 342-run margin that told the tale. India lost 13 wickets, Australia lost 20. India's batsmen were mostly careless or caught in the deep. Their counterparts were bowled neck and crop, leg before or caught close at hand. Six visiting batsmen were bowled between bat and pad, a gap that is not supposed to exist. India played an aggressive game with cool heads. With Australia it was the reverse.
In his blog in the Australian, Jack the Insider provides a satirical review of India's resounding win over Australia in Mohali.
It’s hardly an even contest. The Australian XI is up against 1.3 billion Indians. Even counting Australia’s vast coaching staff, Ponting and the lads are heavily outnumbered. They have entered a world of doctored tracks, dodgy food and questionable tactics.
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Add to that the fact that the Indians have mastered the dark art of reverse swing. Ever see an Indian bowler with a decent manicure? It doesn’t happen. Most have fingernails like Ming the Merciless. Meanwhile, in the heavily manned slips cordon, the Indian catchers are chomping away on some local breath mint that turns their saliva into silicon.
How can this be said without being dismissed as mere wish fulfillment? How can some truths sound so implausible that they can seem like pieces of total fiction? But here it is all the same. The Australians are looking, how to say this… shabby, writes Sharda Ugra in India Today.
In Mohali, they began their pursuit of a target of 516 like bats out of hell, but their batting on this tour has been uncharacteristically circumspect. In the first three innings of this series they have scored at 2.86, 3.12 and 2.63 runs an over. Ten minutes after tea today in Mohali, they were 52 for 4. It took them half an hour to get to 58 and they lost another wicket on the way.
Ganguly the significant, not the great
Posted on 10/21/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Ever since he announced his retirement, Sourav Ganguly has been elevated to greatness, but the fact is he gained by association, writes Suresh Menon in Tehelka magazine.
If Sachin Tendulkar had to be brought down a couple of notches to fit him into the so-called ‘Fab Four’ group, then Ganguly had to be pushed up a couple to settle alongside Rahul Dravid and VVS Laxman. Ganguly was not a great player, but he was a significant one in the context of Indian cricket as its most successful Test captain. Great players are not necessarily significant, nor significant players necessarily great. Barry Richards is an example of the former while Arjuna Ranatunga is an obvious example of the latter.
October 20, 2008
The Ponting-Lee exchange
Posted on 10/20/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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Ricky Ponting and Brett Lee weren't laughing on the fourth day in Mohali
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Ricky Ponting gave all his other bowlers, even Michael Hussey, a spell before turning to Brett Lee on the fourth day in Mohali. Cameron White even got a second. Lee wasn't pleased and was seen exchanging words with his captain. Here's what the Australian papers had to say about it.
It was not until Hussey was introduced and White was summoned for a second spell that Lee cried enough. By chance his captain was fielding a few yards away and Lee took the chance to remind him that he was fit, eager and had in his time claimed a few scalps - more than the rest put together, as a matter of fact, writes Peter Roebuck in the Sydney Morning Herald.
Lee knew how much a raw attack depended on him. He had bowled badly in 2005 and Australia had lost the Ashes. But since Glenn McGrath's retirement he has given the team its cutting edge. Strong, fast and resourceful, he had taken numerous wickets and commanded universal respect. Alas, his bowling had deserted him in India. He had bowled without conviction, plan or accuracy. Everything was broken, it seemed, except his cricketing heart. And now that was under strain ...
... Ponting made one mistake, a fact he must have recognised the instant Lee's grizzles reached his ears. He had not put an arm around his struggling strike force to explain his thoughts. It was an understandable oversight. A captain arrives at a ground with 50 matters on his mind. Something is liable to get missed.
Showing a very public lack of faith in his struggling spearhead, Ponting refused to bowl Lee during the morning session on the fourth day, prompting a prolonged protest from the fast bowler and an animated response from his captain, writes Malcolm Conn in the Australian.
When White claimed the wicket of Gambhir caught at mid-off, Ponting tried to talk to Lee in the team huddle that gathered around catcher Hussey. But Lee kept walking away from Ponting in scenes reminiscent of the clash between then captain Allan Border and his fast bowler Craig McDermott during a county match on the 1993 Ashes tour. On that occasion Border yelled after his paceman: “Don’t walk away from me or you’ll be on the next plane home.”
Jon Pierik gives his take on the incident in the Herald Sun, where he writes that Ponting's emotions spill over a little too often.
Tendulkar’s Everest
Posted on 10/20/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
For long the most startling thing about Sachin Tendulkar’s iridescent career was its inevitability, write the editors at the Hindu.
In England last year, Tendulkar seemed to have reconciled himself to the inevitable slowing down and dimming of his prodigious physical talent. He reinvented himself, subjugating his ego, taking blows on the body, and eking out runs. But just as the experts proclaimed that the newer version of Tendulkar, while less striking, was only marginally less effective, the master did what great champions do. He challenged popular perception by reprising in Australia the brilliant, spontaneous style of his early years. It is fitting that he achieved the honour of becoming Test cricket’s highest run-scorer — Tendulkar went past Brian Lara’s aggregate of 11,953 runs — while playing against Australia, a country where he is revered as the greatest batsman since Sir Donald Bradman.
October 19, 2008
The Mishra mystery
Posted on 10/19/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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Will Amit Mishra have to make way for a fit Anil Kumble?
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Amit Mishra has taken a five-for on his debut and will have another go at Australia in less than 24 hours. Should there be another bagful of wickets and a 1-0 lead to India, anticipate an almighty uproar, writes Sharda Ugra in India Today.
Do you bench the man who had given Ricky Ponting’s New Age XI the most trouble - and had wickets to show for it – to have the captain step in? Or do you drop a batsman, play five bowlers, including the three slow men?
Given the tenor of his newspaper column after Bangalore, it is evident Kumble and the senior Indians feel somewhat hounded and when this debate begins it will become all the rage to ask for his head and slap down his recent statistics. But do not forget that Firozshah Kotla and Kumble are kindred spirits: he has taken 55 wickets at the ground at 15.42 and won three of his ten Man-of-the-Match awards near the tombs of some medieval Delhi sultans. All admittedly on a far stronger shoulder, but Kumble is India’s biggest match-winner because of other sturdier allies than just a 38-year-old rotator cuff.
Cricket offers fewer keener delights than the sight of two beguiling spinners pitting their wits against a battle-hardened batting order. To watch them teasing and taunting, tossing and dropping, mixing up their deliveries, baffling, bamboozling and bowling batsmen through the gate is to see cricket at its best. On the evidence of this match, Australia are going to have a long wait before they perform such feats, writes Peter Roebuck in the Sydney Morning Herald.
The 25-year-old [Amit Mishra] took his first wicket with a classical leg-break that penetrated Simon Katich's stretched defence. His comrades embraced their roly-poly friend with unfeigned affection. In the last over before stumps, he struck with a perfectly pitched googly delivered from around the wicket. It was reward for decades of perseverance. Mishra struck a third time on the third day, castling Cameron White with a slower googly that eluded an optimistic drive. It was another beautifully conceived ball. Kumble might be hard pressed to reclaim his place. Thereafter Mishra toiled in vain. His diminutive stature is a mixed blessing, helping him beat batsmen in the air but denying him bounce.
Another head turner
Posted on 10/19/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
England will be taking a close look at their next opponents, India, during the series against Australia and Vic Marks in the Observer believes India have plucked out another wrist spinner, Amit Mishra, who might have a big influence in the future. In his match report on the second day, the writer feels the legspinner has looked to be more suited than the other debutant, Peter Siddle.
He is shorter than Kumble, bowls slower but has an equally easy action. Yesterday his leg-break crept through Simon Katich's defences, while in the last over of the day his googly, bowled from around the wicket, deceived Michael Clarke, who often seems unusually vulnerable near the close of play .
A view of Tendulkar's slippers
Posted on 10/19/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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Tendulkar has spent all of his adult life fighting for every precious moment of privacy he can find
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Several tributes to Sachin Tendulkar's record-breaking feat have come by the way of personal memories of the batsman. Simon Wilde's are of Tendulkar's slippers. He writes in the Times:
They were like Aladdin’s slippers, curled up at the front and studded with jewels (at least they looked like jewels). Immediately it occurred to me that Tendulkar had placed them there because he didn’t want a stranger to see them. I felt like an intruder. Tendulkar has spent all of his adult life fighting for every precious moment of privacy he can find — the stories are legion of him going out in the dead of Mumbai’s night, sometimes in disguise, to escape the crowds — and here was I, prying into one of the few remaining spaces he could call his own, the space behind an armchair in a nondescript hotel room in Essex.
In the Hindustan Times Pradeep Magazine remembers first meeting Tendulkar, an Under-15 player then, on a wintry evening, in a town in Himachal Pradesh, where the two were sipping tea to keep the cold away.
Dylan Cleaver in the Herald on Sunday believes Tendulkar may not have been the best player of his generation - especially when you have Ponting, Lara, Dravid and Kallis - but he was certainly the greatest.
It is one thing to be facing Sir Richard Hadlee and Wasim Akram while puberty still has you in its embrace; it's even more remarkable to be comfortably fending off the next generation of fast bowlers, like Brett Lee, more than a decade-and-a-half later.
October 18, 2008
The man who would not be crushed
Posted on 10/18/2008 in Indian cricket
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Any more doubts?
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Sourav Ganguly's 16th Test century produced a different reaction to Sachin Tendulkar's passing of Brian Lara's record, writes Sharda Ugra in her blog on the India Today website. Unlike the acknowledgement of the very superior use of a very superior gift, Ganguly's ton would have seen a grudging, amused regard for the man who would not be crushed. She says doubt is perhaps the theme that surrounds Ganguly's career, apart from the adulation of fans in Bengal.
Doubt around his ability to deserve a place in the team to start with, to really hack it in international cricket when he got there, to return as a Test batsman after being dropped, to face top quality fast bowling, to play the pull shot with any conviction, to lead India with any success, to recover from the most brutal public ridicule heaped on an Indian sportsperson in recent times, to return to the team with any confidence, to script his own farewell, to bring to his own career the finesse he brought to a cover drive.
Watching 'Tendlya' bat
Posted on 10/18/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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Tendulkar: the highest run-getter
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Sachin Tendulkar broke Brian Lara's record for most Test runs on Friday in Mohali and Sunil Gavaskar remembers the time he first watched him as a schoolboy in Mumbai and nicknamed him 'Tendlya'. He writes in the Hindustan Times:
... Milind would often call up to say how "Tendlya" had smashed this bowler and how he had toyed with the other. And if he was batting somewhere close by, he would ask me to join him and enjoy his batting. We would then chortle as retired cricketers do seeing "Tendlya" taking apart an attack like he was having a net. It wasn't long before he was picked for India, and we had to reluctantly share our "Tendlya" not just with India but with the rest of the cricketing world...
Writing in the Times of India, Harsha Bhogle says in the last two or three years Tendulkar worked on getting his body back into shape, says Bhogle, and each time it was a more uphill battle than before.
He is still only 35 but because he started so young, and couldn't sign a tour contract till he had scored three Test hundreds, it seems he has been around forever ... But the zest, the limitless energy, the obsession with cricket hasn't dimmed. That, in itself, is extraordinary.
Is he the greatest? The answer for Bobilli Vijay Kumar is yes in the same paper. In this age of hyper nationalistic sport, Tendulkar is perhaps the only player who receives a standing ovation every time he steps out to the middle, Boria Majumdar points out.
No sportsman in history, not Pele, not Babe Ruth, not Muhammad Ali, has had the effect on supporters of the man who became the Little Master, writes Stephen Brenkley in the Independent.
The turnstiles were the evidence: when he was in they flocked through them in their thousands and thousands and when he was out they flocked out again. It is 10 years since India Today reported: "When he goes out to bat people switch on their TV sets and switch off their lives."
The BBC's sports editor Mihir Bose says that what makes Tendulkar exceptional, is that his career has been central to the way cricket has changed in the last 20 years since he made his Test debut against Pakistan at the age of 16.
Continue reading "Watching 'Tendlya' bat"
October 17, 2008
Haddin's bruised chest and ego
Posted on 10/17/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Malcolm Conn, in the Australian, speaks to Brad Haddin, who had a fiery time behind the stumps in Bangalore.
In his debut Test series, on the West Indies tour last May and June, Australia's new wicketkeeper broke a finger on the morning of the first Test yet played all three Tests and the first one-day international before being forced home.
Now Adam Gilchrist's replacement is nursing a bruised chest and ego after the unpredictable Bangalore wicket continued to pitch balls in front of him which leapt up and hit his body or sailed passed unhindered.
In the Age, Chloe Saltau also catches up with Haddin.
Haddin had spoken at length to Ian Healy about the unique demands of wicketkeeping in India before the series, and stood a full five metres closer to the stumps than he would in Australia. The uneven bounce caused some balls to roll along the ground and others to sail over the top of his outstretched gloves.
"It's quite different. The catch you've got to be up close for is the slash that does take off and you've just got to react to."
October 16, 2008
Tendulkar stands tallest
Posted on 10/16/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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Sachin Tendulkar has uplifted lives
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India rides a tide of emotion every time its chosen one enters the arena. A power has been put in Tendulkar's hands that could easily be misused, writes Peter Roebuck in the Age. He pay tribute to the Indian batsman as he closes in on becoming the leading Test run-scorer.
Tendulkar has uplifted lives. He has not railed against colonialism and has instead inspired his countrymen by deed alone. Supporters cherish his introductory masterpieces — daring and almost cheeky — his hundreds scored in adversity, notably in Birmingham and Melbourne, and his later more restrained efforts.
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Tendulkar stands above his contemporaries. For all his fortitude, Steve Waugh was in a lower league, and never imagined otherwise. Brian Lara was dazzling but also destructive. At his best, the Trinidadian was supreme but he toyed with his talent. Vanity and selfishness lingered too long in his character. Viv Richards was explosive but also erratic. Brilliant in his 20s, he did not age as well as the Indian.
From here on
Posted on 10/16/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
The quality of cricket in the first Test at Bangalore may not have been great, but the quality of contest was quite gripping. The pedestrian Australian bowling up against a brittle Indian middle order was a perfect match and perhaps may set up an evenly balanced series, writes Suresh Menon in his column in Dreamcricket.com.
Chances are that India will play the same eleven at Mohali in the second Test (unless Kumble's injuries force him out), thus giving everyone another chance to fail. Sentiment may be a good guide for choosing books to read or persons to date, but it is not recommended for picking cricket teams. Here, balance ought to be the key.
Ponting: The best since Bradman
Posted on 10/16/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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There is a steel in Ricky Ponting which is impossible not to notice
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Questions were being asked of the Australia captain, Ricky Ponting, as he led his team into the series with India. His brilliant century in the first Test suggests he remains one of the great batsmen of this, or any other, era, writes Stephen Brenkley in the Independent.
At the age of 33 (34 in December) Ponting is 20 months younger than Tendulkar and so far his body, unlike that of the "Master Blaster from Mumbai", has shown few signs of rebelling against the constant demands put on it. Nobody ever can become the new Don Bradman – the man scored a century on every 2.75 visits to the Test crease, for goodness sake – but another Australian is building a sound case for being the Best Since Bradman. And as a captain Ponting is creating a record of similar magnitude. Under him, Australia have won 73.3 per cent of their matches, greater than anybody who has led in more than 10 matches: better than Bradman, and better than Ponting's immediate predecessor, Steve Waugh.
It is the ultimate stamp of a great batsman that he makes big runs on big occasions. Since Tendulkar is one of only five players to have made nine Test hundreds against Australia – one more would make him second behind the 12 scored by England's Jack Hobbs – it would be a stretch to accuse him of failing to make the most of himself. But there is a quality in Ponting, a mixture of talent, desire, will and doggedness, that sets him apart.
October 15, 2008
Tests are changing
Posted on 10/15/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Three slips, two gullies, a point - for generations, the arc behind the batsman on the off side was a clear pointer that Test match cricket was on. But the Bangalore Test was different, GS Vivek writes in the Indian Express.
With the slips vanishing quicker than the shine on the new ball, unorthodox placements became the new order over the five days. The Australians, in particular, regularly employed silly mid-off, silly-mid on, mid-on, short-mid-wicket, short square-leg, deep backward square-leg, even as their quicks steamed in. In fact, Ricky Ponting even had a sweeper out on the off side for most part, a ploy repeated by Anil Kumble as boundaries were at a premium and singles remained the source of survival.
“Actually, the new field setting takes a lot of toll on the batsman,” confesses a Team India player, on condition of anonymity. “Even though I didn’t score too many runs, I felt exhausted as I had to concentrate much more with this setting. First you had to pick the right delivery to hit, then you had to make sure the ball was placed in the right area as there weren’t many open spaces and finally, it was important to keep the ball down due to the number of catchers in front of the wicket. From a batsman’s perspective, we often tend to play shots with a set mindset of a Test field. Bangalore was different,” he says, adding that these kinds of fields were here to stay.
Time for Kumble to rethink his future
Posted on 10/15/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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Is Anil Kumble unfairly delaying the Test entry for Piyush Chawla and Amit Mishra?
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Makarand Waingankar asks in the Mumbai Mirror:
[Anil] Kumble was a member of the Indian team when Javagal Srinath was made to delay his international debut as the selectors were keen to let Kapil Dev break Richard Hadlee’s record. For three years Srinath was in the reserves. Surely, Kumble must have witnessed that turmoil of a fellow player, up-close. Would he want in-form leggie Amit Mishra and Piyush Chawla to suffer the same fate?
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By agreeing to the request of Sourav Ganguly to let him play the entire series the selectors have set a bad precedent and have indirectly assured all the seniors that they too will be given a long rope to decide their fate. For this service to the nation, each selector is paid Rs. 25 lakh!
October 14, 2008
Tendulkar's masterstroke
Posted on 10/14/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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"The pleasure derived from watching him (Tendulkar) comes from the way he combines immaculate conception and productivity."
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Peter Roebuck, writing in the Age, provides a comprehensive assessment of Tendulkar’s innings of 49 on the final day in Bangalore which helped India draw the first Test.
Not that Tendulkar was thinking only about himself. The Australians were trying by all means to unsettle his perky partner, Gautam Gambhir. On several occasions Tendulkar walked down the pitch to support his beleaguered pal. Later he became engaged in lengthy discussions of unknown import with the visiting captain. He has always been an involved cricketer. That he was on edge was confirmed by his gesticulations as errant spectators wandered in front of sight screens at inconvenient moments. No distractions could be tolerated.
A glimpse of Australia's weakness
Posted on 10/14/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Barney Ronay feels that although Australia had the better of things in the first Test against Australia in Bangalore, other teams will take encouragement from the game. He writes on the Guardian website:
They are still a formidable bunch but quite how they deal both with a lack of variety and the absence of that genuine, twin-pronged, match-winning penetration will be fascinating to watch – not just for the rest of this series, but during the gruelling whistle-stop itinerary on which Ponting is about to lead his team, with home and away series against South Africa in the pipeline, plus next summer's Ashes. Australia might yet win all of these. But the gap has visibly narrowed. This is a stodgier, more human bunch of world champions, one less assured of punching all the right pressure points at all the right times.
No longer a foreign land
Posted on 10/14/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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Ricky Ponting's boys are far more comfortable in India than previous Australian touring parties
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India, far from being a strange land, is cricket's true home, writes Garry Linnell in the Daily Telegraph. He says that unlike previous touring parties, the current Australian squad touring India would be much more at ease.
"It took me maybe three tours before I finally started feeling comfortable over there," Shane Warne said recently. "I don't know what it was, but I never used to look forward to going. But on my last trip I started to love it and now I think I've come to understand the place."
It's all changing now. India is now the cash cow of world cricket and a professional cricketer will always find a way to love something backed by the green stuff. But there is also a new maturity among the latest generation of Australian cricketers. We first saw it emerge with Steve Waugh and a handful of others, men who saw touring not just as a sporting mission but a self-educational journey.
Greg the mastermind
Posted on 10/14/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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Ploy story: Greg Chappell
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Greg Chappell's knowledge of India’s players, pitches and conditions would have been invaluable to Ricky Ponting's tactics in the first Test. Ayaz Menon in his column in for Daily News & Analysis feels the ex-India coach may have given the Australians a psychological edge going into the second Test at Mohali and expects more gameplans from him.
This is where Chappell’s knowledge, not only of playing conditions, but also the aggressive demands of the public and the defensive mindset of cricketers and administrators would have been invaluable. The debate over the senior pros has spilled over into mindlessness, and aggravated only by the premature hysteria over Tendulkar’s impending world record.
In the same paper, Dilip Vengsarkar feels that though spinning tracks have helped India overcome England and West Indies in previous home series, the going has been tough when the Australians have come visiting. And this time around it's no different as was evident in Bangalore.
October 13, 2008
A chance for the most vulnerable to stand up
Posted on 10/13/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
India's fightback on the fourth day has set the stage for a fascinating climax to the first Test, writes Peter Roebuck in the Age. An interesting feature of the final day, he writes, will be the contest between the "most vulnerable" cricketers, the struggling Indian middle order and Australia's inexperienced bowling attack.
By stumps, much more will be known about the ability of this Australian attack to take wickets on a pitch deteriorating slower than expected. Among the pacemen, Mitchell Johnson has been a handful without ever looking likely to run amok while Brett Lee deserved a better return. Handicapped by a wonky elbow, Stuart Clark was serviceable while Shane Watson's strength was an asset on a grudging surface.
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If anything, the Indian middle order will feel the squeeze even more than the visiting bowlers. India has a match to lose and the senior batsmen have positions to protect. Remembering the form some of them showed down under a few months ago, Australians may be surprised to hear that half of India is ablaze with the call for youth.
October 12, 2008
India's fab four need disbanding
Posted on 10/12/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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The inevitable erosion for India's famed middle order, also comprising Sachin Tendulkar, has begun to gather pace
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Stephen Brenkley, writing in the Independent on Sunday, feels "the final surrender of this greatest of all middle orders in imminent", after their unconvincing performance against Australia in the first innings in Bangalore.
If suggesting to Tendulkar that he might like to consider his options is tantamount to violating a Hindu god, there comes a time in the affairs of man, as W C Fields, that shrewd observer of the human condition, said, when one must take the bull by the tail and face the situation.
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Yet even then there was the faint suspicion that the real glory days were behind them, that reflexes and desire were fading together and that they failed to recognise the slow decline of either. There have been indications since only of deterioration, which did not quite square with the huge expectation before this series, partly fuelled by hype, partly because of Australia's own gentle but discernible downturn, partly because of that recent, eventually tight series between the pair.
Australia's dominance for most of the first Test is a consequence of an intelligent plan skilfully applied, writes Peter Roebuck in the Age. He lauds Mitchell Johnson, who varied his pace and utlised the width of the crease to his advantage while bowling round the wicket to pick up four wickets.
But Mitchell Johnson was the pick of the bunch. His rise through the ranks underscores the Australian methodology. Raw as sushi in his early years, he was gradually brought into the fold and taught to make the most of his blessings. In his days as a plumber's assistant he must have learnt how to turn off numerous taps. Now he stopped the flow of runs and took some critical wickets.
October 11, 2008
Timed to perfection
Posted on 10/11/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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As he did with his leadership, Ganguly has set the tone among his peers
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Sourav Ganguly's standards are uniquely his own, be it batting or fitness, success or failure, writes Sharda Ugra in the India Today.
As he did with his leadership, Ganguly has set the tone among his peers. The most incendiary of Indians has admitted that the fires have gone conclusively cold. Cricket at 30-something is a struggle in which a player's peak mental awareness must manage the slow erosion of physical skills. Every day is a tussle between the will and the inexorable passage of time and it is not ever a fair contest.
Selectors stumble on the right spinner
Posted on 10/11/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
In the Age, Brendan McArdle writes that Australia's selectors might have stumbled on the right spinner for the Test team - Cameron White - despite struggling to manage the nation's spin stocks over the past year.
MacGill was then taken to the West Indies after minimal cricket and again proved to be horribly underdone for the task. In an unprecedented move that was an embarrassment for the entire selection panel, the feisty New South Welshman decided enough was enough and pulled stumps on his career mid-series.
Surely the selectors should have known better. McGain should have been taken, not long-term project player Casson. They should also have done everything in their power earlier to convince Hogg to squeeze another 18 months out of his career. In the end the constant uncertainty about his future as a Test player must have been a factor in his retirement. He deserved better, and how valuable he would be now.
One of Australia's selectors, Jamie Cox, tells Andrew Faulkner in the Weekend Australian that there are no easy answers and spin-bowling in Australia has become "a bloody tough craft".
October 10, 2008
Daring to dream
Posted on 10/10/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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Michael Hussey looked like he had belonged in Test cricket all his life
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It is not so long ago that Michael Hussey was cast as a reliable batsman lacking the special ability required to break out of his mould. But on Friday he was in the thick of the action, looking like he belonged, looking like he had been in Test cricket all his life, writes Peter Roebuck in the Melbourne-based Age.
So there he was, the immovable object, holding the innings together, ensuring that the Australians did not squander their advantage. To that end he wore down the attack, thereby adding to the pressure on the home batsmen. Better than most, Hussey knows the value of secured runs. As usual he advanced unobtrusively and it took a glance at the board to realise that he had reached 24 and then 43 and the other posts along his route. He does not set out to collar the bowling, just to score as quickly and as safely as possible.
All that hard yakka in domestic cricket taught him a lot about making the right decisions at the crease. Discernment had been a weakness. Those seasons did not curb his ambition so much as inform his mind. Accordingly, he arrived in Test cricket armed with a lot of knowledge and plenty of experience. He was able to bat regularly and to study his craft without feeling that his career, his entire life, depended on the next ball.
Hussey showed that the art of Test batting comprises protracted defence and sporadic attack, of knowing the field and stealing the singles, and batting with the tail, writes Rohit Mahajan in Outlook.
Ravi Shastri, writing in the Hindustan Times, feels India's batsmen need to watch out for the variable bounce on the Bangalore pitch. He adds that Virender Sehwag's performance in the series may well prove decisive in the outcome.
Sehwag is the man of the moment. He doesn’t hold himself back, howsoever wretched a cricket pitch be. He knows the vagaries of this strip and was thus prepared to take his chances while the ball was still new. It wouldn't get any easier for him now but Viru knows only one way to bat.
Ganguly isn’t finished with the game yet
Posted on 10/10/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Following his outburst on being unfairly scrutinised, Sourav Ganguly may have drawn a lot of pressure on to himself at the start of the Tests against Australia, but the pressure is unlikely to affect him much, writes Harsha Bhogle. He adds that the fiery denial of retirement from Anil Kumble has taken the attention away from Sachin Tendulkar. Read on in the Indian Express.
A lot of very fine players retire as bitter men; for the rest of their substantial life they carry the hurt of denial, believing they could have done more. It is one of the saddest things in the game and given the kind of career he has had, Ganguly must go out as a man at peace with himself.
October 9, 2008
Substance over style
Posted on 10/09/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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Ricky Ponting and Simon Katich set the tone for Australia with a 166-run stand
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It's been a long time since an Australian second wicket pair batted as wilfully and attentively as did Ricky Ponting and Simon Katich on the first day of the first Test in Bangalore, writes Peter Roebuck in the Age.
Truth to tell it was not the most exhilarating batting performance seen in the past few years, but then we have been richly entertained, perhaps spoilt. Certainly it lacked élan, not to mention panache, but the dogged willow wielders had more serious matters in mind. Australia has too much respect for these opponents to give them an inch.
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Ponting batted with a control that told of a man on top of his game and in charge of himself. He relied not on instinct but judgment, studying the ball carefully and then directing it into a gap. Realising that square leg had been pushed back, he took the pace off the ball and took a single. Nothing wrong with singles, though they have fallen from fashion. Ask Sachin Tendulkar, who has fed upon them. Another time he tapped the ball towards short cover and collected another notch. He intended to cook his opponents slowly.
October 7, 2008
Please, no more recriminations
Posted on 10/07/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Peter Roebuck, in the Sydney Morning Herald, previews the India-Australia Test series and finds himself writing that Bryce McGain’s loss is the most significant – a difficult thing to imagine a year ago. He also believes there is no room for the kind of bitterness that affected the last series between the two teams.
Some thought the Australians behaved like boofheads. Others were convinced the visitors had stirred the possum. Regardless, it cannot be repeated. Nor can the rude catcalls heard last time around in India.
More than either side might care to admit, though, last summer's campaign was a battle between brothers. Australia's cricket history tells of an egalitarian nation determined to advance by its own lights. From Fred Spofforth to Ricky Ponting, the Aussies have played an uncompromising game.
Spinner curry
Posted on 10/07/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
In the Age, Peter Hanlon concocts a new recipe for Matthew Hayden’s next cookbook: Spinner Curry.
Ingredients: onions, olive oil, curry paste, tomatoes (tinned), stock, sweet potato, green beans (chopped), rice, a spinner. (NB: spinner does not need to be fresh).
Haydos says: "I used to love hopping into this when Warney was around — it had so much spice and fizz and bounce, and meaty chunks you could really get your teeth into! I'm not sure what's happened of late, but it's been as bland as an Adelaide Oval wicket. You wouldn't waste a good poppadum on it."
'It's a pity that umpire referrals will not be used in this series'
Posted on 10/07/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Sunil Gavaskar, writing in dreamcricket.com, feels it is unfortunate that the umpire referral system will not be used in the India-Australia Test series. He also writes about the timing of Laxman’s removal from captaincy of the Deccan Chargers team and Sourav Ganguly’s puzzling absence from the NCA camp in Bangalore.
On pitches that will help spin and with fielders surrounding the batsman, the system would have been a big help in defusing potential confrontation situations and that's why it is a pity that it wont be used in this series. Not many "walk" these days and that can lead to a feeling of frustration if the reprieved player goes on to play a match turning innings as happened last season.
October 6, 2008
Selectors in a spin
Posted on 10/06/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
In the Age, Chloe Saltau writes that the Australian under the most pressure in India is not Ricky Ponting or Jason Krejza or Mitchell Johnson. It’s Andrew Hilditch, the chairman of selectors.
For the first time in more than a decade, a period in which Australian cricket was so flush with talent that the biggest decisions were about who to leave out rather than who to pick, the focus settles squarely on Hilditch and his men, Merv Hughes, Jamie Cox and David Boon.
Whatever happens in the next three days, they will have to gamble on an uncapped and untried bowler to support the relatively established pace trio of Brett Lee, Stuart Clark and Mitchell Johnson, who nevertheless have not played a Test in India between them.
Nor do Cameron White, Jason Krejza and rising Victorian paceman Peter Siddle — the three candidates for the last bowling spot — have a baggy green between them, but that would not be of such concern if they, like so many of the ready-made replacements the selectors have been able to turn to during the changing of the guard in recent years, had extensive qualifications in first-class cricket.
Jon Pierik in the Daily Telegraph considers a few of the problems facing Australia in this series.
The changing of guard
Posted on 10/06/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
The changing of guard is a fascinating spectacle, whether at the Buckingham Palace or on the sports field, writes Suresh Menon in his blog on espnstar.com.
Australia arrive in India having completed the first half of the operation - the old guard is nearly gone - but with the more difficult half, the new guard replacing it satisfactorily, incomplete. For India, the old guard is looking at its watches, at calendars, at the record books as if to suggest that there is time yet.
The growing importance of India-Australia cricket
Posted on 10/06/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Boria Majumdar, writing in espnstar.com, tracks the evolution of Indo-Australian cricketing relations since Indian-born KS Ranjitsinhji’s successful tour of Australia as a part of the England team in 1897-98
Despite being handicapped by frequent bouts of asthma, Ranji scored 189 in his first match of the tour, and 175 in his first Test in Australia. Ranji, thus, had achieved the unique distinction of scoring a century on debut against Australia both in England as well as in Australia. His performance down under had a multi layered impact. In Australia it was a triumphant tour for him. He became the darling of the people and created what has been called the "Ranji fever". There were Ranjithsinghji sandwiches, Ranjitsinghji hair-restorers, bats and chairs". In India, Ranji's batting was perceived as a triumph of nationalism on the sporting field.
Meanwhile, Neeru Bhatia, in the Week, pays tribute to Sachin Tendulkar, who Indians would be hoping will live up to his stellar record against Australia.
October 5, 2008
'I can't put a date on calling it quits'
Posted on 10/05/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Anil Kumble recently rubbished reports that seniors in the Indian side are being forced into retirement by the BCCI and the selectors. Today, in an interview with the Times of India, India's Test captain says he has not set a time-frame for calling it quits from the game. Kumble speaks about his own preparations for the high-profile series starting next week, India's chances against an inexperienced Australia, and captaincy.
Changing the guard
Posted on 10/05/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
We have been down this road before, thinking wishfully, ignoring history and hoping against all the evidence that Australia's domination of international cricket is nearly over. It's what a fool (such as I) thought before the last Ashes tour; there's wrong and there's 5-0, writes Kevin Mitchell in the Observer.
And yet... there is something clearly vulnerable about an Australia squad touring India, the toughest gig in the game, that, when it was selected, included four players - Doug Bollinger, Peter Siddle, Bryce McGain and Jason Krejza - who not only had not a single baggy green between them but were largely unknown outside the sports pages of the Sydney Morning Herald and other fine Australian newspapers ... But there are also three players who have broken into the Test team only in the past two years: Brad Haddin, Chris Rogers and Mitchell Johnson
India will start favourites
Posted on 10/05/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
So would it be fair to say that India begin as strong favourites at home all over again? Can they intimidate Australia with turning tracks? The answer, if the initial indications from Hyderabad are anything to go by, is a fairly powerful yes, writes Bobilli Vijay Kumar in the Times of India.
The new selection committee under Kris Srikkanth has put an end to all the speculation churned out by the press with regard to the status of the senior players, writes WV Raman in the Hindu.
October 2, 2008
Ganguly's selection saga
Posted on 10/02/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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Ganguly was included in the squad for the first two Tests against Australia after being dropped for the Irani Cup
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The new selection committee's decision to retain Sourav Ganguly for first two Tests against Australia, despite his omission from the Rest of India squad for the Irani Cup, has evoked varied responses.
An editorial comment in the Deccan Herald suggests the BCCI’s new selection committee, wary of ruffling feathers early into its term, may have toed the old line by retaining Ganguly. However, acknowledging the value experienced players like Ganguly add to the Indian squad, it favours a gradual 'phasing-out' of the old guard, as the team could not risk losing such a solid middle order in one go.
Over the next few months, the decision to blood younger batsmen must be implemented. It has to be a gradual process, for the less experienced ones will need the comforting presence of long-standing bulwarks to break themselves in at the Test match level. It will be in the best interests of Indian cricket if the seniors are taken into confidence and thanked for their contributions while politely being told of the need to start the rebuilding process so that Indian cricket doesn’t flounder when these men of substance call it quits of their own volition.
R.Mohan, in the Asian Age, agrees that Kris Srikkanth, the new chairman of selectors, must take players into confidence before making the tough calls.
S. Dinakar, writing in the Hindu, feels Ganguly’s inclusion is justified. Ganguly’s experience, his performance against Australia earlier this year and his impressive record since his comeback against South Africa at the Wanderers in 2006-07, he writes, merit him a place in the side.
Meanwhile, in the Times of India, Bobilli Vijay Kumar writes the new selection panel appears no different from its predecessors, and that its decisions are consistent with earlier trends.
As it turned out, the panel proved as adept and slick as all the earlier ones. Instead of picking XIV, it cleverly added a XVth member. Smooth. As the big list sunk in, however, the rumours were up and running again.
Daily News and Analysis’ Ayaz Memon rubbishes rumours of any ‘deal’ between the BCCI’s selection committee and Sourav Ganguly, but feels Ganguly’s inclusion is as explainable as it is confusing.
For an opinion that questions the selection committee’s “sudden about-turn” after Ganguly was excluded from matches in the run-up to this series, read Jayaditya Gupta’s article on Cricinfo.
September 30, 2008
It's payback time
Posted on 09/30/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Never mind what Lalit Modi’s motives might be in letting out the premises of the Rajasthan Cricket Academy to the Australians for a camp in the run-up to the Test series. India has always been this way for visiting teams whose cricketers are made to feel quite so privileged and special. India also have a right to expect the same in return, writes Sharda Ugra in her blog on India Today.
The RCA’s was merely a yogic extension of Indian cricket’s routine backward bend. True sabotage, on the other hand, is what happened during the 2004 Nagpur Test versus the Aussies, which was where that Final Frontier actually fell.
Nagpur cricket authorities produced a wicket that was described as a “birthday present for Glenn McGrath” by the curator and a “22-yard suicide note” by a visiting English journalist.
September 29, 2008
Batting for Dravid
Posted on 09/29/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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Dravid took the battle to himself first, as it were, and then to Delhi in the Irani Trophy
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The most important performance in the Irani Trophy came from Rahul Dravid, feels Ayaz Memon in Daily News & Analysis. His uncompromising approach to spending as much time as possible in the middle would have told the Aussies that he may well be the man to watch out for in the Test series.
The more significant aspect of Dravid’s performance I believe, however, was his splendid catching at slip. The diving effort to get rid off the dangerous Viru Sehwag was breathtaking in its execution, and match-winning in its impact. Quick-silver reflexes, terrific anticipation coupled with great ball sense showed that Dravid’s cricketing instinct was hardly blunted
September 28, 2008
Hot' Bhajji must let ball do the talking
Posted on 09/28/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
R Mohan, writing in the website Krishcricket, believes Harbhajan Singh should flight the ball more instead of firing it in quickly.
There are a few better sights for the connoisseur than when Harbhajan is giving the ball that bit more of air and allows his whiplash action to get the ball to spit at the upper portion of the bat and gloves of the bemused batsman.
In the era of eased restrictions on wrist flex, there can be no complaints over Bhajji's bowling action, which in any case he had remodeled pretty soon after suspicions had first been aired. But, as a bowler forced to mix styles because of the three types of cricket he plays, he may have picked up the ugly style in which he tries to bowl 100 kmph yorkers.
Pray, Jaipur does not haunt us like Nagpur
Posted on 09/28/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
In the Hindustan Times, Pradeep Magazine compares the build-up to Australia's tour - especially the facilities provided to then by the Rajasthan Cricket Academy - to the green top they received in Nagpur in the 2004 series.
The important question that needs to be raised is, did Chappell get wickets prepared at the Academy on specifications from the Australians? As the head (or chief consultant) of the cricket academy in Rajasthan, he had an advantage of being in a position where he could get things done - which were otherwise not possible. Here, he was performing dual roles in conflict with each other. As a consultant of the Australian team, he has to serve their interests but as the RCA academy chief, he, in many ways, is answerable to Indian cricket interests as well. Or am I wrong here?
September 27, 2008
Sehwag and Hayden will be most influential
Posted on 09/27/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
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Peter Roebuck: "Sehwag is a superb batsman. At first sight he brings to mind one of literature’s more jovial characters, Pickwick or Micawber or Falstaff"
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Virender Sehwag and Matthew Hayden will be the most influential batsman in the forthcoming Test series. If one man falters his team will be forced into its shell, and if one dazzles the bowlers may fall back in disarray, writes Peter Roebuck in the Hindu.
No man succeeds by accident. Always it is by design. Until he started belting them around, the Australians criticised his footwork. Indians were more worried about his brain. But Sehwag is neither a fool nor a clown. Rather he is the most fearless of batsmen, a trait that makes him vulnerable but also dangerous. Captains fret about opponents capable of upsetting the best laid plans.
"No team comes to India as well prepared as Australia does; prepared for the conditions, for the opposition and, more than anything else, to embrace the land they are going to," writes Harsha Bhogle on ESPNStar.
Australia will be delighted too at how India are being portrayed in their own media. Open the newspapers or switch to the news on television and you will see obituaries being written for Dravid and Tendulkar and Ganguly and Kumble and even for Laxman who averages 50.94 in the last twelve months with 917 runs in 13 games! It means the pressure will be on India's batsmen, as much to take on the Australian bowling as to prove themselves once again to their own countrymen! It is something that a cricketer has to live with but it is the response of these senior cricketers that will be as interesting.
September 25, 2008
Greg Chappell's role no threat to India
Posted on 09/25/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Ian Chappell, writing in Mid Day, feels the Indian team should not worry too much about their former coach Greg Chappell assisting the Australians in the upcoming Test series.
If the Australian captain doesn't know how he wants his bowlers to attack Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid, Virender Sehwag and VVS Laxman after playing against them for a decade, then Greg isn't going to be of much help.
...
And despite Ricky Ponting's struggles with the bat in India he's still played eight more Tests in the country than Greg. That's right, Greg didn't play a Test in India and even though he's watched a lot of cricket under those conditions there's nothing like actually having been out in the middle.
An editorial in the Indian Express also banishes fears that India’s secrets are up for revelation to the enemy camp.
Australia's new boys sneak under the radar
Posted on 09/25/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Australia's squad has arrived in India and, as Daniel Brettig from AAP reports, there was not the typical fanfare for a few of Australia's players.
The tourists' arrival at their Jaipur hotel was notable for the number of players able to sneak in past the Indian media pack without raising anything so much as a quizzical ‘who are you?’ glance.
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All the options have a story to tell. There is Siddle, the fast medium bustler just back from a shoulder injury he carried bravely through the Sheffield Shield final for nine wickets and his spot in the tour party. Krejza is a combative off spinner who last spring was banned from pre-season training with Tasmanian state teammates for drink-driving. Watson, a blonde Adonis of an all-rounder when fit, is out to shake his history of getting injured at the worst possible times.
But best tale of the lot is probably that of McGain, a bespectacled, 36-year-old single father of two who is near certain to become the nation's oldest Test debutant since another ageing wrist spinner, Bob Holland, surprised the dominant West Indians for NSW and Australia in 1984-85.
September 22, 2008
Dizzy spells out Australia's plan
Posted on 09/22/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
In the Sydney Morning Herald, Alex Brown chats to the retiring Jason Gillespie about likely Australian game-plans for the tour of India.
"I heard Ricky Ponting say that they'll probably use tactics similar to 2004, and I think that's the right way to go," Gillespie said. "I remember one of the big things we did was working on the fitness of the Indian batsmen. They're not regarded as the fittest blokes in the world, and generally score their runs either walking singles or hitting fours. So we would have three or four sweepers out at different times, and the tactic worked really well. To VVS Laxman and Virender Sehwag it was particularly effective.
September 20, 2008
Kumble and McGain have a lot in common
Posted on 09/20/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Writing in the Hindu, Peter Roebuck compares 130-Test veteran Anil Kumble with 36-year-old Test hopeful Bryce McGain and surmises that the two legspinners belong to a small group of survivors.
Both took up an absurdly difficult style of bowling, a style demanding a contortion of body and wrist so tricky that hardly anyone survives exposure to it.
The game is strewn with the hopes of wrist-spinners forced into submission by their calling. They live for the beauty of the perfect leg break and are sustained by occasional instances only to be driven back towards dementia when the next ball lands yards from its intended destination.
September 19, 2008
Bad boy gone good
Posted on 09/19/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
"I'm sick of all the bad boy crap. I have no interest in hearing about how controversies follow me wherever I go. I'm going to concentrate on not getting involved in any kind of crap."
That is Harbhajan Singh's take on his career ahead of the series against Australia, which starts on October 9 in Bangalore. Speaking to the Hindustan Times' Kadambari Murali, Harbhajan opens up on a dramatic last 12 months, Anil Kumble, Ricky Ponting, criticism of his bowling, and how the past never plays a role for him.
September 18, 2008
Symonds' absence leaves Australia vulnerable in India
Posted on 09/18/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
With Andrew Symonds stuck at home and a generation of world-beaters now retired, India can regain the ascendancy over their rivals, writes Dileep Premachandran in his Guardian blog.
The common factor in Australia's solo wins in the 1998 and 2001 tours was Adam Gilchrist's attacking methods, feels the writer, and that is where Symonds' role would have been crucial in India.
With Gilchrist now part of Australian cricket folklore, it was Symonds who inherited the mantle of middle-order enforcer. It is a task he has warmed to, averaging a stunning 72.07 from 12 Tests since coming back into the side during the last Ashes. India have been his favourite opponents. In the hullabaloo over what was said or not said at the SCG last season, it was forgotten that Symonds' 162, with a little help from snoozing umpires, changed the game and series. It was also forgotten that his 410 runs and nine wickets (at 27.44, far better than the mouthy Harbhajan) made him the standout performer over the four Tests. Only once did he fail to cross 30.
Meanwhile the Times of India looks at what lies in store at the four venues which will be hosting the Tests.
September 16, 2008
Ponting returns to his nemesis
Posted on 09/16/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
An average of 12.28 in India doesn't do justice to Ricky Ponting's ability as a batsman. With the four-Test series coming up, Ian Chappell analyses the flaws in Ponting's technique and approach to facing quality spin bowling in India. Clayton Murzello of the Mid-Day spoke to Chappell and here's what he had to say:
Adjusting to playing good spin bowling in India is the toughest challenge facing an Australian batsman. The important things in this regard are finding a survival method watching the ball off the pitch really closely, working out what shots you can and can't play and learning that you have a fraction of a second longer to play the ball off the pitch when compared to Australia.
September 14, 2008
Buchanan upbeat about Australia's chances
Posted on 09/14/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Former Australia coach John Buchanan, who oversaw his team’s historic Test series win in India in 2004, believes the current Australian squad picked for the tour of India, despite its inexperience, has the wherewithal to repeat the feat. Daily News & Analysis’s Vijay Tagore interviews him.
On Australia's bowling
None of the pacers has played Test cricket in India but Lee, Mitchell Johnson and Stuart Clark should be able to play to the expectations. I understand the series will be played in the days of a new season just as we had played India in 2004. The October-November weather in India should assist the Australians. As a consequence, I expect the pitches to be lively and outfield grassy. So Lee & Co. should have no worries. Spin department, as I’ve said, is a bit inexperienced.
Worrying times these
Posted on 09/14/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Referring to the blasts in New Delhi on Saturday, Anand Vasu in the Hindustan Times feels that India may well be following the status of neighbours Pakistan with regard to a global boycott.
With the Champions Trophy unable to get off the ground as teams refused to tour Pakistan on security gorunds, a precedent has been set, the implications of which are dire, from a cricketing point of view
September 13, 2008
Relief for India
Posted on 09/13/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Andrew Symonds’ absence from the Australia touring party leaves it shorn of a forceful cricketer and character, writes Peter Roebuck in the Hindu.
India has felt his power at the crease and will be relieved to be spared any repetition. Never mind that he was patently caught behind the wicket before he had taken command, still Symonds’ innings in the ill-mannered Sydney Test match was one of coruscating power. Once he was underway, Anil Kumble and company might as well have been firing popguns at a tank. It was an exceptional assault.
Add the all-rounder’s athleticism and knack of breaking partnerships with seamers or off-breaks and his capacity is revealed. But Symonds’ influence on the Australian team goes beyond runs and wickets. Something in his nature causes colleagues to circle the wagons around him. Perhaps it is that he took so long to make his mark, or the knockabout way he talks, or his fondness for fishing, or his humour, or his shyness, or the vulnerability caused by his mixed background. Heck, even the New Zealand judge called upon to disentangle the SCG Test liked him.
September 11, 2008
'Definitely' bigger than the Ashes
Posted on 09/11/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Simon Katich says Test series between India and Australia are "definitely" bigger than the Ashes. Sai Mohan interviews Katich, currently in India leading the A team, and he talks about his experience of their last Test series in India in 2004 on cricketnirvana.com.
On Sourav Ganguly missing the Nagpur Test:
Oh we thought it worked towards our benefit. We smelled a rift in the enemy camp and it was good for us. We saw some grass on the pitch and loved it. We carried a lot of confidence after the comprehensive victory in Bangalore. We were going into Nagpur knowing that we could strike the rod when it was hot. However we were beware that the Indians have a fantastic batting line-up and we could not have made the mistake on underestimating them. So I would say the feeling in the camp was brilliant and we surely did party hard after clinching the Nagpur Test. It was one of the happiest moments in our cricketing lives, to know that we had done something that our predecessors had not achieved.
On Adam Gilchrist's captaincy:
Oh! Adam Gilchrist's captaincy on that tour was simply fabulous. The manner in which he tackled the spinners and handled the bowlers was amazing. John Buchanan made a lot of useful contributions too. We used to sit and chalk out plans on how to dismiss VVS Laxman and Rahul Dravid and touchwood all of them worked to our advantage.
September 7, 2008
India and Australia on shaky ground
Posted on 09/07/2008 in Australia in India 2008-09
Peter Roebuck believes the outcome of the upcoming series between India and Australia will depend on decisions taken beforehand. He writes in the Hindu:
Not long afterwards Brad Hogg had retired from Test cricket. Everyone assumed that he had been offered a deal but it was not so. He’d had enough. It’s been a long time since an accredited Australian cricketer walked so blithely away. Shaun Tait also stepped aside, temporarily in his case. Wounded by exposure and expectation, he lost confidence and yearned for the shadows ... Now Andrew Symonds has been dispatched ... Brett Lee’s personal problems and Ricky Ponting’s injury add to the impression that the Australians are vulnerable. Certainly it seems that the coach and captain have lost their grip.
But India is also on shaky ground. Already the limited-over side has shrugged off the past and sought vigour and vitality. Meanwhile the Test team remains unchanged. Everyone recognises that the great men are growing old together.
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