i3j3Cricket :: A blog for fans of Indian cricket…

The Real Test begins!

6 February 2010 · 16 Comments

India take on South Africa (RSA) in a 2-Test series starting today (6 Feb 2010). It is a battle between #1 and #2 sides in the ICC Test rankngs. Having said that, in my view, the ranking system cannot really be that good if it rewards a team that has never won a series in Australia or South Africa! Nevertheless, thems the breaks. India did not construct the ranking system!

The fact is that, starting today, the 1st ranked Test team takes on the 2nd ranked Test team in what will be a cracker of a contest. I can’t wait. Bring it on!

In my view, if India come out of this with a win or a draw (a) it will be a minor miracle, (b) I will start to accept this team as a “good” if not “terrific” team, (c) the team will have secured help from spin-friendly pitches.

I have absolutely no problems with spin-friendly pitches in India. Let me state my position on this VERY clearly. The day I see/hear/read Ian Chappell and Mikey Arthur complain that Perth and Durban are too bouncy and offer their home teams undue advantage, I might consider writing an article bemoaning spin-heavy conditions in Chennai or Kolkata. You don’t expect to go to San Fransisco and whine that the city does not have the Taj Mahal! Similarly, Indian pitches afford spin. Night follows day!

Considering the fact India is without Rahul Dravid, Yuvraj Singh (possibly) Laxman and Sreesanth, India are behind the eight-ball against a full strength opposition that is itching to claim #1. Given this I am doubly sure that India should offer the kinds of pitches that the local soil and environment offers and should NOT “doctor” pitches to offer unnatural conditions.

M. S. Dhoni is yet to lose a Test as India captain. I will not be surprised if he blemishes his copy book in this series against a hungry opposition. The loss of Dravid, Yuvraj and, possibly, Laxman will be a blow. While their “replacements” will, no doubt, be tough competitors, the real blow is likely to be to the mental approach of the rest of the batsmen. If Sehwag, Gambhir, Tendulkar and Dhoni, the mainstay Indian batsmen, adopt an early-90s Indian batsmens’ mental attitude, then India will, I believe, be cooked in this series. India needs the above four to play with clear minds.

The batting replacements for Dravid, Laxman and Yuvraj Singh are good, but untested at this level. It is a perfect opportunity for Badrinath, Vijay and Rohit Sharma to announce their names on a big world stage. I do not mind this bapism one bit. As I said earlier, this to me is a test of Indias recent strides as much as anything else. These stores have been impressive. This test will reveal if luck played a bigger role than warranted.

South Africa has problems too. They are without a full time coach and a selection committee. Even so, I’d rather have their problems than have 4 key players on the injury list. The real problem for South Africa, in my view, are (a) the forms of Ashwell Prince and Duminy, (b) ability to take on quality spin, (c) the form or Paul Harris.

The above problems are, in my view, smaller than those that India faces.

So I expect a tough, gripping and exciting cricket. I think South Africa might win unless India prepares spinning pitches.

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India’s spinning reserves

3 February 2010 · 3 Comments

VVS Laxman in Opening Up has mentioned among other things the lack of bench strength as far as spinners are concerned. CricInfo also has an article dedicated to this comment, and hopefully this will help highlight the problem a fair bit. But I am a bit surprised at the attention it is getting.

This is not a new problem. Since Bedi, Venkatraghavan, Prasanna and Chandrasekar left the scene, there has been only one reliable spinner who we can call a match winner – Kumble, and even he is not a spinner in the classical mould.

Harbhajan Singh, probably comes in next, but he is who I call a “confidence bowler”. If he gets a wicket or two, then he is suddenly a different bowler – you soon see the flight, the loop and turn in his bowling. Give him a bit of stick, and his bowling becomes flat, fast and defensive.  Since Kumble’s retirement, Bhajji in my opinion hasn’t really stepped up, either. Granted, India haven’t been playing as many tests as we would like them to, but he has had only one 5 Wicket haul since Kumble’s retirement – you would expect more from your main spinner.

The pitches in India haven’t helped either. Who would have thought that someone like Murali would struggle to get wickets in these flat pitches either?

There have been spinners in the Indian team who have come and gone – Dilip Doshi, L. Sivaramakrishnan, Shivlal Yadav, Maninder Singh, Venkatapathy Raju, Sunil Joshi, … the list goes on and on. But, in the last 25 years or so, we’ve never had great spin reserves. Actually, this is true for most countries – there are good quality fast bowlers cropping up all the time, but spinners are harder to unearth. Let us look at the spinners currently playing Test cricket around the world -

  • Australia – Nathan Hauritz
  • Bangladesh – Shakib Al Hasan
  • India – Harbhajan Singh, Mishra, Ojha
  • Pakistan – Danish Kaneria, Saeed Ajmal
  • Sri Lanka – Murali, Herath , Mendis
  • West Indies – Suleiman Benn
  • South Africa – Paul Harris, Botha
  • England – Graeme Swann, Monty Panesar
  • New Zealand – Daniel Vettori, Jeetan Patel

If I were to pick quality spinners from that list, I would pick two or at the most three. If that is the case, then imagine what the reserve list is like.

Having said all this, India’s spinning reserves while not being great is not that bad in my opinion, when compared to other countries. Apart from Harbhajan Singh, we have the following bowlers -

Leg spin

Mishra, Chawla

Right arm off spin

Ashwin, Mohnish Parmar, Ramesh Powar, Lahiri

Left arm orthodox

Ojha, Iqbal Abdulla, Murali Karthik, Appanna, Jadeja, Aushik Srinivas, …

The two leg spinners in the list have already played for India and currently Mishra seems to have the edge over Chawla. Although Mishra has bowled well in the opportunities he has been provided with, let us not kid ourselves – he is a good support bowler, but is unlikely to run through a side easily – even, while playing in India. Or maybe, I should say, especially while playing in India. The Indian pitches have not been kind to wrist spinners (with the exception of Kumble – but he is not, as I said earlier, a wrist spinner in the classical sense). The Qadirs, the Warnes and the likes have come and gone with little success here. There is something in the pitches in India that doesn’t really suit these kind of bowlers. So, if I were a selector I would pick a leggie based on the pitch and the team they are facing. Which means that we have to pick 3 spinners in the side (not in the playing XI, but the XV).

As far as off-spinners go, we seem to have quite a short fall. Ramesh Powar has been tried with little success, and I am not sure if he will be tried again. Mohnish Parmar has a suspect action, and although he has now been cleared, he will need time to prove himself. The only other bowlers in this category happen to be R. Ashwin from Tamil Nadu and Saurasish Lahiri from Bengal.  Of the two, Ashwin is a contracted player and may get a look-in ahead of Lahiri. I don’t think Ashwin is quite ready for the longer version of the game, but he may actually be the next in line if Harbhajan Singh is injured and we need an off-spinner. (Interestingly, I read an article in the Hindu about the lack of off-spinners recently. I googled to find what the link was and here is the actual article – http://beta.thehindu.com/sport/cricket/article61426.ece)

The list of left arm orthodox bowlers is quite long, though. The standouts currently are Ojha and Abdulla, and although Ojha bowled reasonably well in Bangladesh, we need to see him play against a team like South Africa to see where he really stands as a bowler. Ravindra Jadeja has not bowled badly, but most people still see him as an all rounder and it is unlikely that he will be picked in the team just for his bowling. I think the next bowler in line, in this category after Ojha would be Iqbal Abdulla from Mumbai.

So, if I were to pick the 3 back-up bowlers for Harbhajan, Mishra and Ojha (the three currently in the team), I would go with R.Ashwin (right arm off break), Chawla (right arm leg break) and Abdulla (left arm orthodox). Just because we have 3 names doesn’t mean they are ready or anything. It means BCCI, NCA, the MAC academy, etc need to nurture them – put them in the ‘A’ teams, the Board President XIs, etc; offer them the guidance that they need and…just get them ready.

I know we keep talking about India’s spin reserves, but what about India’s fast bowling reserves – sure, there are a lot of people around, but if Zaheer has an injury in this series – India would struggle to find a good replacement.

Think about that.

-Mahesh-

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Vijay Bharadwaj?

2 February 2010 · 3 Comments

http://www.cricinfo.com/indvrsa2010/engine/current/match/442750.html

Cricinfo, at this point, includes “retired” Vijay Bharadwaj in the Board President’s X1 team for their game against SA. They, however, have omitted Sadanand Viswanath, Vinod Kambli, Praveen Amre, Gagan Khoda, Vivek Razdan, Atul Wassan, and Krishnamachari Srikkanth from the side. How did Mr. Bharadwaj get so lucky?

-Srikanth

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A healthy ball.

1 February 2010 · 2 Comments

Dramatis Personae. 

Michael Atherton. (Captain)
Marcus Trescothick
Rahul Dravid.
Sachin Tendulkar
Andrew Symonds.
Shahid Afridi
Hansie Cronje
MS Dhoni (wicket keeper)
Imran Khan
Waqar Younis.
John Lever.
Stuart Broad (12th man)
********** 

This composite team lines up against a World XI 

Act 1. Scene 1. 

Dressing Room. 

Athers: All right listen up everyone. We’re bowling. On the field in fifteen. 

Imran, tossing the ball back and forth with Waqar; “Keep the shine on the Kookaburra, boys.”

**************
Act 2. Scene 1.

Since this is a combined media production, there is a close-up of a four piece ball as a backdrop. The ball is beautifully, immaculately shined on one side, the figure of the Kookaburra still in mint condition. The other side though, looks like the proverbial dog’s breakfast-scratch and scuff marks, rhythmic serrations, lifted seam. The demarcating seam though is immaculately clean. 

As Athers leads the troop back into the dressing room, shoulders a-slump, Afridi’s still running fingers through his hair making sure it looks picture perfect for that elusive L’Oreal contract. 

Athers: Goodness Gracious me, 371 in fifty overs, and I thought between the lot of us, we’d have been able to make that ball sing Mozart’s Requiem in D Minor.

Imran: Well, I surreptitiously scratched up the ball with my bottle top as I ran in…
Waqar:…and I gave it a nice long lick to load up the rough side. Must admit, the Chennai earth tastes just as dodgy as the water.
Hansie:…as well as digging my studs in as we waited on the boundary decision.
Athers:…besides adding the best of British dirt into the scratches.
Lever:…Don’t forget the invisible Vaseline on the shiny side.
Symonds:…and my sweat, topped off by some zinc cream
Tresco:…and a varnish of my mint-spit.
Dravid:..I don’t admit to producing any spit from my lollies
Sachin:..nor do I admit to cleaning the seam of any dirt or spit with my fingernails.
Dhoni:…The boys bowled in the right areas..sorry, the extra long flaps on my gloves weren’t really needed, as the ball didn’t swing as we thought it would.
Afridi: None of your tricks did the job, so, as I normally do, I thought I’d bite it with my specially sharpened incisors, canines and molars, paid for by the PCB,….but that %$#@! Viru just kept hitting us for six!

Act 2. Scene 2. 

Tresco: Say, is it just me, or does anyone else feel queasy?
Waqar: No, same here. I vote we elect to go home ill.

**

Disclaimer: Chill guys, an impromptu, spur-of-the-moment confection. No malice intended.

Soundar

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India team for SA series

28 January 2010 · 8 Comments

In the previous post, Mohan had speculated what the Indian team would like for the South Africa series, as a number of players were out due to injury. The selectors have named the team and this is what they have come up with  -

  • Virender Sehwag
  • Gautam Gambhir
  • M Vijay
  • S Badrinath
  • Sachin Tendulkar
  • VVS Laxman
  • MS Dhoni/Wriddhiman Saha
  • Harbhajan Singh
  • Zaheer Khan
  • Amit Mishra/Pragyan Ojha
  • Ishant Sharma/Sudeep Tyagi/Abhimanyu Mithun

On the surface, this may look OK, but there are a couple of things I just don’t get:

2 Wicketkeepers for a home series

I don’t see the point of having 2 wicket keepers for a home series – unless Dhoni’s back is really dodgy. Is it? In which case, he shouldn’t be picked in the team in the first place – it really is not in the team’s best long term interests to risk Dhoni.

It was really interesting to see DK being dropped from the team. If there were 2 ‘keepers picked in the team, I would have punted that the other would be Dinesh Karthik. But the reserve WK musical chair goes on, with Saha being given a chance. I am not sure he will get a game, though…

Bowler/Batsman ratio

It looks like Badrinath may finally make his debut. And although, people may argue that Kaif is the in-form player or that Raina should have been picked, I have no problem with picking Badri in the team. What irks me though is that we have 6 batsmen for the 6 spots in the team and 7 bowlers for the 4 bowling spots. It just doesn’t add up. We should have picked up either Raina, Rohit Sharma or even Kaif as a backup. With 2 regular batsmen out of the team, I don’t see India playing a 5 batsmen-5 bowler combination.

And, I don’t see Mithun getting a game ahead of Ishant Sharma or Sudeep Tyagi either. If he does, then that would be a grave injustice to Tyagi.

What is the point of picking someone in the team if they weren’t in serious contention? Unless of course, the selectors know something we don’t…

-Mahesh-

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India Vs SA: Both teams in turmoil before First Test

28 January 2010 · 3 Comments

For different reasons, both India and South Africa (RSA) — ranked #1 and #2 in the world respectively — are in some turmoil leading up to the First Test between these two countries starting 6 Feb.

Team India has a few wounded soldiers in her ranks while the RSA team management has suddenly imploded. After being summarily dismissed from the ICC Match Referee panel after his infamous contributions to the Sydney Monkeygate Test, Mike Procter has been sacked as Cheif Selector in his own country and along with him, his entire selection committee! The RSA coach, Mickey Arthur has stepped down too, citing difference in vision with Cricket South Africa (CSA). The selection panel now comprises Gerald Majola, CEO of CSA, Keppler Wessles and interim coach van Zyl.

Seems to me to be a case of too many chiefs and too few Indians!

Which is really a nice segueway to the problems the Indians are facing themselves.

Unlike the dramas in RSA which are of Pakistanesque proportions, the problems that Team India faces are all injury related. And frankly, since it is the on-field stuff that really matters, I feel that India are behind the eight-ball in this clash of two champion sides.

Rahul Dravid, V. V. S. Laxman, Yuvraj Singh and Sree Santh are all on the injury list. Two of these are vital for the teams’ success against the second ranked team in the world. One of these injuries is a blessing in disguise, in my view, while the other is neither here nor there (but mostly there)!

Rahul Dravid is in sublime form and will be a vital cog in the armoury against a very good pace attack that includes Dale Steyn, Morkel and the fast improving Wayne Parnell. Similarly, in recent times, Laxman’s role in the spot that Sourav Ganguly vacated has been one that he has relished. He has been solid and has adapted well the the changing needs of that important role, which requires acceleration at times and a blocking-rebuilding at times of an upper-order crash.

If both Dravid and Laxman remain injured, my view is that RSA will start as favourites in the Test series.

Yuvraj Singh’s injury will bring a ray of hope to any of the many understudies who are waiting in the wings of Indian cricket. And there are plenty of those waiting to strut their wares in a middle order that seems almost impregnable. Players like M. Vijay, Rohit Sharma, Suresh Raina, Virat Kohli, Mohammed Kaif, Badrinath, Ajinkya Rahane, Manish Pandey and Cheteshwar Pujara would have picked up their bats as well as their prayer beads as soon as they heard of Yuvraj Singhs’ injury! A few of them may have to put their hands up and put on a show when the South Africans come to town.

I suspect that 2 middle-order positions may be up for grabs. In saying so, I assume that Yuvraj Singh is certainly out of the 1st Test and perhaps one of Dravid or Laxman may not play.

I feel that, given his recent probationary stints, M. Vijay must be a shoe-in for one of these spots. Logically, Badrinath ought to be the one that claims the other spot. He has spent many years in the wings. However, he might miss out on the basis of his recent poor showing in the Duleep Trophy and Mohammed Kaif’s recent strong (and timely) form — he has scored a double-century and a century last week in the ongoing Duleep Trophy.

Sreesanth’s injury is less of a concern to me. Bowlers like Sudeep Thyagi will fit the bill quite nicely. Moreover, I think India will prefer going with two pacemen and two spinners in the Tests against RSA.

Ideally, the team selection ought to wait until the end of the Board President’s XI game. However, the team for the 1st Test is being selected today. The Indian selectors should go for the following team, in my view:

Virender Sehwag
Gautam Gambhir
Rahul Dravid / M. Vijay
Sachin Tendulkar
V. V. S. Laxman / Rohit Sharma
Yuvraj Singh / S. Badrinath
M. S. Dhoni
Harbhajan Singh
Zaheer Khan
Pragyan Ojha / Mishra
Ishant Sharma / Sudeep Thyagi

– Mohan

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Indian Domestic Scene — India-A Team

21 January 2010 · 3 Comments

Let me say it at the start: Ranji Trophy sucks! Big time!

In fact, let me alter the statement: The whole Indian domestic scene needs a serious re-vamp that is based on cricketing logic and not on regional-voting political-considerations.

The fact that India is able to produce the sorts of cricketers that it does is perhaps despite the clutch of domestic tournaments and — in my view — not because of it.

The Ranji Trophy, the prime Inter-State tournament in India commenced on Nov 3 2009 and concluded on Jan 14 2010. In other words, the single most effective tournament, from which India gets to harvest the next generation of talent, lasts a bit over 2 months! Is that enough? More importantly, is that fair?

What’s more? The Ranji Trophy has 15 Teams in the Super League (split into 2 groups). In addition, the Ranji Plate League has 11 teams split into 2 groups?

A question to ponder first up: Does the BCCI not like even numbers? What’s wrong with a Super League that has 14 teams split in two even groups of 7? And what’s wrong with a Plate League with 12 teams split into two groups of 6 each?

Be that as it may, that is way too many teams to cram into a 2-month window of matches and still expect a good harvest of talent at the end of the pipeline. Contrast this with the Australian Domestic scene. The Sheffield Cup, which is the equivalent of the Ranji Trophy, has just 6 teams in it. The tournament commences in early-October (13 Oct 2009, in the 2009/10 season) and ends in late March (23 March 2010 in the 2009/10 season). The formula is: fewer teams, more space in between games and more opportunities for Australian national players to play a few domestic games even as the International season is under-way in Australia! Each of the 6 teams play each other at home and away. There is a sense of fairness and balance too in the crafting of a proper tournament. We then would not need neutral curators and other such artificial artefacts that the BCCI wants to implement!

No wonder Rahul Dravid talks of a longer gap between Ranji games which might lead to more interesting games and tighter finishes!

But then, as Anand Ramachandran writes funnily on Cricinfo’s Page-2 spoof, for the BCCI, the Ranji Trophy is perhaps an irritation that has to be tolerated — much like a pimple on ones’ backside. The BCCI would perhaps much rather close down the Ranji Trophy and concentrate its efforts and its money tills on the lucrative and glitzy IPL. After all, one can only glitz up the Ranjis so much!

Furthermore, there are way too many domestic tournaments that need to be squeezed into the calendar. Soak this in. Challengers, Corporate Cup, Irani Trophy, Ranji Trophy, Duleep Trophy, Deodhar Trophy.

Hello! What’s going on? Is anyone even aware of the plethora of meaningless competitions that are on offer? There is a mess that needs cleaning up.

But rather than fix the whole mess, I’d like to start by suggesting a few small improvements to the Ranji Trophy which might make it more interesting for the player, the fan and the organisers with the outcome being a richer harvest of the talent pipeline.

  • Split the current 26 teams into 4 Divisions: Div-A (5 teams), Div-B (6 teams), Div-C (7 teams) and Div-D (8 teams).
  • Each team in each Division play each other at Home and Away.
  • Top two teams from Div-A play for the Ranji Finals A.
  • A4, A5, B1 and B2 play semi-finals to decide Ranji Finals B. Two losers get relegated and the two finalists stay in Division-A for next season.
  • B5, B6, C1 and C2 play semi-finals to decide Ranji Finals C. Two losers get relegated and the two finalists stay in Division-B for next season.
  • C6, C7, D1 and D2 play semi-finals to decide Ranji Finals D. The two finalists stay in Division-C for next season.
  • Teams in Div-A have more break between games and teams in Div-D have less of a gap between games and that would be “fair game”, I’d think.

But despite all the cramped schedules and the many dull draws, the Ranji Season did produce some excitement and some comfort for the Team India fan. There is certainly a good crop of young talent that is coming through the ranks.

I would certainly like to see some of the following young and talented players go as part of an India-A-Team to England, Australia and South Africa sometime this year.

M. Vijay / Ajinkya Rahane / Abhinav Mukund
Cheteshwar Pujara / Suresh Raina
Rohit Sharma / Mithun Manhas
Virat Kohli / Manish Pandey
S. Badrinath (capt)
Wriddhiman Saha / Puneet Bisht (wk)
Irfan Pathan / Ravindra Jadeja
Ashok Dinda / Abhimanyu Mithun
Sudeep Tyagi / R. P. Singh / Munaf Patel
Iqbal Abdulla / Aushik Srinivas
Piyush Chawla / R Ashwin

Most of the above had a good Ranji season and are knocking on the doors of national selection. It would be good to see them have a taste of conditions elsewhere before they play there in senior colours. Although players like Virat Kohli or Suresh Raina or Badrinath have played in Australia (in the Emerging Players Cup in 2009, for example), it is only reinforcement as well as repeated exposure that will remove fear of alien conditions from their minds.

– Mohan

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India v Bangladesh Test 1 Day 3

20 January 2010 · Leave a Comment

Day 3 of the first test between Bangladesh and India saw the most overs being bowled so far in a day in this test – and yet they fell shot of the required quota for the day by about 20 – that gives an indication of how much cricket has been played in these three days.

Bangladesh, like India didn’t capitalize on the good start they got to lose their way early to be 98 for 6, well before lunch. But as it happened in the only test that India failed to win against Bangladesh, India let them off the hook. In that other match, their No. 8 scored 79 – in this match, he scored 69. The names of the players may be different, but those runs have been significant contributions. The first one from Mortaza saved the test for Bangladesh, and it remains to be seen if the performance from Mahmudullah, is enough to save this test.

As I had predicted, India managed to take the lead – but by just one run :) India then finished the day on 122/1 with an overall lead of 123. Sehwag again failed to capitalise on the good start, getting out for 45. Mishra came out as night watchmen and remained not out on 24 with Gambhir on 46 at close.

The plan for India would be to add another 200 odd  runs and declaring early to give their bowlers sufficient time to bowl out Bangladesh in the remaining overs…which could get sufficiently decreased owing to the weather and bad light.

-Mahesh-

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India v Bangladesh, Test 1 Day 2

18 January 2010 · 3 Comments

With India struggling at 218/3 at the end of day 1, Bangladesh was hoping for a solid performance to consolidate its position on day 2. For a while, it seemed like they were getting there, but 3 wickets in the space of eleven balls did more damage to their chances than what the score card shows.

I know it is still too early to say, but having knocked Bangladesh back to 59/3, India certainly seem to have the edge in this test now. Unless Ashraful and/or Shakib Al Hasan do something extra “ordinary” tomorrow, I think India may even end up taking a first innings lead. 

Earlier in the day, Tendulkar made 29 of the 30 runs India added, to notch up his 44th Test hundred (and his 89th international hundred). .. Boy, what a record that is. He may not get to a hundred hundreds in international cricket before he retires, but I don’t think he is done yet :)

With only half the number of overs bowled in two days of play and so many truncated sessions, it is hard to do a session by session score card – but one thing is for certain, if we made a SBS scorecard, the clear winner would be none other than the weather :(

-Mahesh-

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India v Bangladesh, Test 1 Day 1

17 January 2010 · 3 Comments

Flashback to May, 2007. India had just come out of the World Cup debacle and were in a state of shock. After the effigy burnings, backlash and public scrutiny, the team that eventually landed in Bangladesh was probably not in the right state of mind. Before the team was selected, there were even calls for seniors (including Tendulkar to be dropped), and when the team was named, the likes of Sehwag and Harbhajan Singh had been left out. Even though India were playing against the lowest ranked team in the world, some people believed that India were vulnerable and could even be defeated. 

Coming back to January 2010 – things couldn’t be more different for India. With its new No. 1 ranking, India is a strong and confident side. And, although Sehwag sounded arrogant when he claimed that Bangladesh were an ordinary side, a lot of people knew he was probably right – there was no way India was going to lose.

But what happened at the end of day 1? India were struggling at 213/8, and quite relieved  to take the bad light when it was offered to them. Not what you would have expected when India had raced away to 60-odd runs by lunch in just 13 overs.

Although India are currently ranked No. 1 in the world, they still aren’t the best team in the world – which I think they can become. For that, they need to start playing good cricket consistently, and a way to get out of tight situations…like the one they are facing today.

The match is far from over, and India can still recover – it promises to be an interesting Test…and I thought I’d never say that when India plays Bangladesh.

-Mahesh-

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