The Hindu : Sport / Cricket : Negative mindsets and negative approach

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Apr 08, 2008
ePaper | Mobile/PDA Version

Sport

Sport - Cricket

Negative mindsets and negative approach

After the disastrous show in Ahmedabad, the Indian think-tank stands exposed, writes Makarand Waingankar

Time and again the sight of green grass has led to the downfall of Indian batsmen, despite the fact that these very batsmen have excelled on foreign soil.

The Ahmedabad Test proved again that batsmen with that mindset can never be in a position to negotiate the new ball once the demand of the team to shave off the grass was not met. The preference for the SG Test ball aggravated the situation.

Knowing well the strength of the South African attack, wouldn’t it have been sensible to use the Kookaburra ball that the Indian bowlers played with for three months in Australia rather than the SG Test ball? The latter, because of the protruded seam assists the bowler in swinging prodigiously and later the hardness helps in the reverse swing.

The Kookaburra balls are a lot softer and have a flat seam that never helps the seamers. However, Indian spinners prefer SG Test balls because of the grip.

If that was the underlying strategy, then Indians ought to have played with three spinners rather than three medium-pacers. This present Indian team consists of legends and now add the ruthless Sehwag to that bunch, which on several occasions has encountered such conditions in England and New Zealand.

Apart from 42 all out in 1974 in the Old Trafford Test, all the other low scores have been due to poor batting.

But, of late the Indian batsmen have been known to adapt to the grassy wicket and the bounce very admirably. In fact no other team came close to beating the Aussies at Perth in the last decade.

The mental make-up of the Indians at Perth was quite positive which pushed the Aussies on the backfoot all the time. Why then the Indian team kept insisting on shaving off the grass, is something they must explain. During the Nagpur Test against the Aussies in 2004, it was captain Ganguly who backed out when the curator refused to shave off the grass, allowing the opposition to indulge in mind games a day before the match.

Beauty of a pitch

The Ahmedabad pitch was a beauty, though the same can’t be said about the Chennai pitch which didn’t have good carry. The curators should never be blamed because they are prescribed the recipe by the players most of whom are blissfully ignorant of the process of preparing a pitch. All that they know is that less watering makes the pitch help the spinners and grass will help the seamers.

In the infamous Test at the Wankhede Stadium against the Australians, the curator (not Polly Umrigar) listened to the team and watered less only to see the pitch become dusty on the second day. All that the spinners had to do was land in the area and leave it to the surface. The Test was over in less than three days. Judging by the look of the Chennai pitch and the comments of the pitch readers of the television channels, it was predicted that the pitch would facilitate the spinners from the third day onwards. It didn’t.

Whereas at Ahmedabad, the curator maintained two days before the game that in the 45 degree extreme heat with sand-base it was imperative that the pitch had to have grass, lest the surface would become loose with cracks — just as one witnessed in the Test against the West Indies in 1983 on the same ground. One wonders why the curators of the respective Test centres of any series are not invited for a meeting with the captain and the selectors as they do in other countries. Strategy management is the key to success.

One wonders what the inputs of the coach Gary Kirsten were. All one is inclined to say is that if at all there was any strategy devised by Kirsten then it wasn’t very evident. The Indian think-tank is exposed.

Corrections and clarifications

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Sport