Indians present Test on a platter to Pollock's men

By G. Viswanath

BLOEMFONTEIN, NOV. 6. The Indian batsmen were guilty of throwing the match away in haste on the fourth day of the first Test of the Castle Lager/MTN series. They faltered at every step and fell grossly short of setting a reasonable fourth innings target for the home team. They were outsmarted by the South African captain Shaun Pollock, who returned a match haul of 10 wickets to walk away with the Man of the Match award.

As the day began, an Indian fightback did not look impossible though the team trailed by 184 runs in the first innings. But when four of the batsmen, regarded as world class, can muster only 85 runs, a drubbing inside four days is inevitable.

It is a shame that Rahul Dravid has been asked to don roles he's least comfortable with, like opening the innings. Newlands, Cape Town in 1996, was fresh in memory. He was sacrificed conveniently for the sake of finding the right balance, and suffered criticism.

Shiv Sundar Das and Venkatsai Laxman had been efficient in the last session on Monday while handling the pace of Mornantau Hayward and the skill of Shaun Pollock.

But, there was no worse sight in four days of action here than seeing Das chase a ball pitched almost in line with the return crease. There was some confusion on Tuesday morning whether his birthday was November 5 or July 1, but Das did not appear to be a confused man in the middle, if the first impressions were anything to go by. He picked up two fours, square on the off-side off Jacques Kallis, to take India past 100 in the very first over of the day.

Laxman cut Pollock through the gap in the slip region for the third boundary of the morning. A dozen runs in the first two overs - at run a ball - promised much for India and the second wicket pair. But Pollock struck the first blow when he had Laxman shaping for a forcing shot to a rising ball and edging to Kallis at second slip. The dismissal was similar to the way the South African captain outwitted Dravid on Monday evening. The second wicket had raised 79 runs in 87 minutes before Laxman perished.

Though Laxman struck a boundary to suggest he was well in control, that was not the case. His dismissal proved that a player has to concentrate and get his focus soon irrespective of the fact that he has spent 81 minutes at the crease the previous evening. Laxman's dismissal also proved that the Indians have a knack of slipping into a pressure situation from a position of comfort.

A couple of balls after Laxman's exit came the indiscretion from Das as he flashed at a delivery from Hayward that was wide of the off-stump. Das must have sensed an opportunity to pick an easy four but had to pay a heavy price. The Indian team management is likely to be lenient with him for playing such a horrible shot, given his potential.

Das' exit ushered in Sachin Tendulkar. He stayed focused for an hour and three minutes, the backfoot drive off Pollock being the pick. He then flicked Makhaya Ntini to the midwicket fence before becoming Kallis' 100th wicket in Test cricket.

Even a determined Tendulkar could not curb himself from driving at a wide delivery from Kallis, the resultant outer edge carrying as far as Herschelle Gibbs stationed at backward point. This was not misfortune the way Tendulkar encountered in the second innings of the Mumbai Test against Australia when Ricky Ponting took an acrobatic catch, the ball coming of the back of short leg fielder, Justin Langer; this was a poor shot and a fairly straightforward catch to the fielder.

Tendulkar and Ganguly had taken the score from 108 to 154 and for all practical purposes were the last recognised pair although Virender Sehwag had to be counted on to make a contribution, having earned the right to be treated as a dependable batsman with a century in the first innings. Tendulkar's lapse in concentration cost India heavily and the second innings as well as the match was up for grabs for Pollock and his men.

At the stroke of lunch, Ganguly fell to a rising delivery again - the bowler was Makhaya Ntini this time - as the ball took the Indian skipper's glove before landing into the safe hands of Mark Boucher. There were 15 boundaries in the first two hours, two of them coming through byes and leg byes. Thirteen came off the bat - one by Laxman, two each by Das and Tendulkar, three by Ganguly and five by Sehwag, who was lucky to see Neil McKenzie dropped a sitter at square leg as he flicked Kallis on the rise.

Pollock made an important decision at lunch - to tie himself up at one end. He bowled an incisive spell of eight overs and four balls to bring an end to India's resistance, 40 minutes before tea. The last wicket pair of Srinath and Ashish Nehra added 31 runs, the best moment being Nehra's straight six off Kallis.

During the course of his mop-up operation, Pollock took 10 wickets in a match for the first time in 59 Tests. India's second innings lasted three minutes short of five hours, humiliating for a team that claims to have at least four world class batsmen in its ranks.

SCOREBOARD

INDIA - 1st innings: 379

SOUTH AFRICA - 1st innings: 563 


INDIA - 2nd innings:

S.S. Das c Boucher b Hayward           62
(120m, 96b, 13x4)
R. Dravid c Kirsten b Pollock          11
(25m, 17b)
V.V.S. Laxman c Kallis b Pollock       29
(87m, 63b, 5x4)
S. Tendulkar c Gibbs b Kallis          15
(63m, 35b, 2x4)
S. Ganguly c Boucher b Ntini           30
(96m, 71b, 5x4)
V. Shewag b Pollock                    31
(49m, 36b, 6x4)
D. Dasgupta c Boucher b Pollock         4
(42m, 31b)
A. Kumble lbw b Hayward                 4
(25m, 19b, 1x4)
J. Srinath c McKenzie b Pollock        16
(39m, 25b, 2x4)
Zaheer Khan c Boucher b Pollock         0
(1m, 2b)
A. Nehra (not out)                     17
(31m, 29b, 1x4, 1x6)
Extras (b-4, lb-8, nb-6)               18
                                      --- 
Total                                 237
                                      --- 

Fall  of wickets: 1-29 (Dravid), 2-108 (Laxman), 3-108 (Das),  4-
154 (Tendulkar), 5-188 (Ganguly), 6-195 (Sehwag), 7-202 (Kumble), 
8-206 (Dasgupta), 9-206 (Zaheer).

South   Africa  bowling:  Pollock  21.4-10-56-6  (4nb),   Hayward 
23-8-74-2 (1nb), Kallis 15-3-56-1 (1 nb), Ntini 10-3-39-1.

SOUTH AFRICA - 2nd innings:

G. Kirsten (not out)                  30
(59m, 48b, 4x4)
H. Gibbs lbw b Kumble                  1
(12m, 8b)
J. Kallis (not out)                   21
(46m, 34b, 4x4)
Extras (nb-2)                          2
                                     ---
Total (for one wkt)                   54
                                     ---

Fall of wicket: 1-6 (Gibbs).

India bowling: Srinath 5-1-13-0 (1 nb), Kumble 4-0-23- 1 (1  nb), 
Nehra 3-0-9-0, Khan 2.4-0-9-0.

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