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If it is Toronto, it must be Ganguly!

One thing has never been lacking in an India-Pakistan match, and that is spirit.

Sadly, that was what was conspicuously absent -- at least on the part of Pakistan -- in the first game of the Sahara Cup. Not to put too fine a point on it, Pakistan batted badly, bowled badly (except for patches) and fielded badly right through -- not surprisingly, they lost, and badly at that, going down by six wickets.

When something like this happens, you tend to look for reasons. Maybe, you think, all that bribery and match-fixing stuff being talked about is damaging team morale -- after all, Salim Malik and Ijaz Ahmed were named, and both are playing here. Or, you speculate, maybe it is Aamir Sohail's elevation to captain -- after all, despite all the denials, the likes of Anwar, Inzamam and Moin Khan, key members of the squad, had categorically informed the PCB that they didn't favour Sohail for the top job.

Then you think of India's performances in the not so distant past that similarly lacked in spirit, and you think maybe this is one of those phases most teams go through.

Whatever. The bottomline, here, was that Pakistan lost the match with the bat -- erratic bowling, especially at the start of the Indian innings, only hastened the inevitable defeat.

Mohammad Azharuddin -- apparently in that stage of his career when he can do no wrong even if he tries -- won the toss and inserted the opposition, saying in the post-toss briefing that he thought there might be something in the pitch for his three seam bowlers.

The pitch itself seemed to offer little to justify that optimism, turning out nice and dry and hard, with a layering of grass well rolled into the surface. Though a drizzle did delay start of play, it's been an unusually hot summer in Toronto, so the kind of sub-surface moisture that made the pitches at Toronto a seamer's dream last year was not likely this time round. And India, without Tendulkar at the top and Jadeja and Robin in the middle, could be counted at a disadvantage in a chase.

Yet Azhar inserted, and he got it absolutely right!

For which, thanks in the main should go to Srinath, Prasad and Agarkar, obviously revelling in the fact that they were spearheading the attack, together, for the first time. Initially, Agarkar -- overexcited perhaps by his track record, and hell bent on outshining his partners -- proved rather wayward, spraying it around a bit. But Srinath compensated with a magnificient spell of controlled fast bowling that produced figures of 6-0-17-1 in his first spell. And when Agarkar came back to replace Srinath, he had lost that skittishness, and settled into bowling with his usual thought and skill. At the other end, Prasad slid smoothly into harness, bowling with great accuracy and much deception, and proving almost impossible to get away.

Pakistan, it must be said, compounded its own problems. Afridi's strokeplay looks spectacular when it comes off -- but frankly, I think he doesn't come good often enough to justify his promotion to opener. The first ball that he faced, which happened to be Agarkar's first ball of the match, went sailing over extra cover for a six. Rah, rah went the crowd! And then Srinath bowled, and it was a different ball game -- the faster pace, and shorter length, meant that Afridi couldn't come on the front foot, his discomfort was obvious and Srinath ended his misery with a beauty that lifted off a length, took the inevitable edge and flew to Azhar at second slip to give the Indian skipper his 141st catch in ODIs.

From that point on, the rate of progression of the Pakistan innings tells its own story: 22/1 in 5 overs; 36/1 in 10; 51/1 in 15; 68/1 in 20... at that rate, the batsmen (Sohail and Anwar, both light years away from their best touch) were merely piling on the pressure on themselves. On this pitch, 250 is a winning score, 225-230 a defensible one -- but anything short of the 200 mark was always going to be next to impossible to defend. And here, Pakistan was batting itself into a corner.

On the other hand, there was a focussed, purposeful air to the Indian effort in the field. The bowlers held length and line admirably, bowled to their field and, barring a profusion of wides, produced a disciplined effort. Ganguly, revelling in what must be his favourite cricket ground, meanwhile proved me horribly wrong on one count -- I had thought, seeing the condition of the track, that he wouldn't be as useful this time round as he was last year in vastly different conditions. But there seems to be some remarkable alchemy which works for him here -- no matter what the conditions, he gets wickets in Toronto.

Here, he stuck to the virtues of line and length, using the incutter and the awayswinger to beguile the batsman and keep him guessing. And by then, the pressure of a stuttering run rate was telling on the batsmen in any case -- thus, error followed error, and Pakistan went from 68/1 in 20, to 79/3 in 25.

Sohail, obviously feeling the weight of captaincy, went for a predetermined pull at Ganguly, the ball never did get up as much as the stroke requires, and the batsman was trapped plumb in front. An over later, Sohail, who appeared to have some trouble reading Kanitkar right (I suspect because Anwar kept looking for turn, whereas the bowler was concentrating on spearing the ball in, flat and fast, on a defensive line), went back and attempted to flick the bowler off his pads, missed, and went the way of his captain, plumb in front.

This brought Salim Malik and Inzamam ul Haq together. There is no disputing Malik's class as a batsman, but the last game he played at this level was exactly 12 months ago, at this same venue, in the previous edition of the Sahara Cup. A year's layoff from international cricket, and the rust was bound to accumulate -- no matter how much domestic cricket you play, the top level is a different ball game. And Malik, besides, would be less than human if that match-fixing furore didn't weigh on his mind. The result, he was way below his usual silken best, reduced to pushing the ball around. And Inzamam, on the day, appeared far from being all there, as well.

Thus, the two most experienced players in the side were singularly unable to turn the game around, and Pakistan went from 79/3 in 25 to 92/3 in 30, 104/3 in 35 and 129/4 in 40. Number four was Inzy, who, having smashed Ganguly, in predetermined fashion, for six over midwicket, attempted an encore, this time on the off side, backed away in premeditated fashion and ended up getting the bottom of the bat to a wild slash, presenting debutant Jatin Paranjpe the opportunity to take a well judged catch at sweeper cover.

With Javed Miandad as coach and Sohail as captain, you would think the Pakistan think tank had enough experience to get the basics right -- imagine, then, the surprise when Abdul Razzack walks out at the fall of the fourth, ahead of the likes of Ijaz Ahmed, Moin Khan and Azhar Mahmood. Perhaps he was sent out to have a slog, but all he did manage was to look singularly uncomfortable, before finally touching a regulation leg cutter from Ganguly to the keeper.

160/5 in 45, and time was running out for Pakistan. Malik decided that desperate measures were needed -- trouble being, he is not the kind of batsman fitted for the slog. A more obvious ploy would have been for him to continue holding one end up, letting the guys at the other end do the hitting. Malik, however, took the job on himself, kept stepping away from the stumps and slashing at everything. He had some slight success with the tactic, against Agarkar. Then came Srinath, a bowler too experienced to feed that stroke. Malik predictably stepped away, Srinath followed him, the batsman could only heave in hope, the ball ballooned off the top edge and Srinath, sprinting to near the square leg umpire, took the catch, surviving a collision with Ganguly in the process.

Ijaz, proverbially a shaky starter, was just about beginning to fire, pulling savagely at anything fractionally short. He crossed over while the Malik skier was in the air and, off the very next ball, slashed at one outside off for Azhar to make a hard catch, low to his left at point, look ridiculously simple.

Azhar Mahmood has a deserved reputation with the bat, and the flick he played at Agarkar was quite a good shot -- only, the late swing the bowler gets with the old ball made the difference between the middle of the bat and the edge, the ball going at a nice catching height to Joshi on the deep midwicket fence.

Two wickets in the 46th over (Srinath), one in the next over, to Agarkar, and any prospect of a late charge was effectively snuffed. Aqib Javed endured moments of misery out there, till Agarkar ended it with a beauty on middle stump, squaring the batsman up, then moving away just enough to clip the off stump.

Moin Khan did his best, striking two lovely sixes, but he was in far too late to do much good, and Pakistan ended on 189/9 -- finishing way below what would have been a challenging total.

For India, it was a fine all round performance on the field. Every single bowler did his job to perfection -- so much so that Azharuddin ended up with an embarassment of riches, not having to bowl Joshi till more than half the overs had been completed. For this luxury, he will want to thank Kanitkar, who turned in a fine first spell of 5-1-12-0 and Ganguly, 7-0-15-1, bowling in tandem to shut the batsmen down in mid-innings. It also gave the captain the luxury of rotating his bowlers at will and keeping the screws turned tight on the batting side, right through.

Aiding this was a good all round fielding display, the throwing in from the deep in particular indicating that the recent camp in Chennai had done the team a world of good.

Came India's turn at bat, and Pakistan's best hope was to bowl tight and force mistakes. What they did was the exact opposite -- producing a bowling display of such shocking ineptitude that it was no wonder Sohail alternated between biting his nails and flashing despairing smiles. Early on, Ganguly pulled a hamstring and had to retire hurt, which meant Pakistan had by default got rid, at least temporarily, of their biggest nemesis of last year. At the other end was Sidhu who, thanks to blisters on the foot, had not had one single net during the camp and was obviously rusty. He was joined by Azharuddin, and a tight bowling display would have put the pressure on.

Instead, Mohammad Zahid (who has lost a bit of that electric pace he started out with but is still lightning quick over 22 yards) and Aqib Javed had their own competition going -- on the lines of which of the two could serve up more lollipops for the batsmen. They bowled short, they bowled wide, they fed the favourite shots of both Azhar and Sidhu as though programmed to do so. And India galloped along: 17/0 in 5 becoming 49/0 in 10 and 75/0 in 15.

It looked like India would coast to a win -- and then Azharuddin went for a third run that wasn't there, and ran himself out. Ganguly came back, but an over later, Zahid, back for his second spell, produced a good yorker, Sidhu played a lazy drive and was about a lifetime too late bringing his bat down on it, and lost his off stump.

Dravid came in to a torrid reception -- Sohail, aware that the batsman had been dropped from the side for a while now, and would be anxious to perform, surrounding him with three slips, a short cover and a short midwicket, an unheard of field for a one dayer in this day and age, and letting Zahid slip his leash.

The bowler made up for his earlier shoddiness with a magnificient display of sustained hostility, bowling at his fastest. Ironically, Dravid handled everything that Zahid threw at him with aplomb, only to lose it to the bowler at the other end, Abdul Razzaq.

Razzaq had been the only one to bowl with discipline right through, bowling to his field, well within himself and concentrating on a tight, run-denying line. Dravid, obviously feeling the pressure of his recent omission from the side and perhaps wanting to prove that he could hit the ball with the best of them, played an out of character drive to a ball not in the slot for the shot, and ended up feathering it to Moin Khan.

India, suddenly, were 113/3 in 25.

At this stage, Ganguly slashed wildly at Razzaq, the ball took the edge, and neither slip moved. It was an inertia that finally cost Pakistan the match, for the edge was a regulation catch for a halfway decent slip fielder and should have been held. Reprieved, Ganguly went on to bat Pakistan out of the game, while Kanitkar held his own at the other end. And when the young all rounder left, touching an edge to the keeper, debutant Jatin Paranjpe came in and further underlined his reputation for strokeplay by starting off with a six over square leg, and going on to show that he was no dummy with the bat.

Ganguly's hamstring played up again, but by then, India were only three short of the target, and Paranjpe duly got the side home with an off driven four.

For Pakistan, Razzaq was the only bowler who excelled throughout. Zahid was supremely impressive in his second spell. The others produced the odd good ball -- but spoilt it with shoddy work for the most part. And the fielding was, in a word, atrocious, except for a brief spell in the middle when, following the exit of Sidhu and Azhar, the fielding side sensed they had a chance and lifted their performance several notches.

Which brings up the captaincy question. Sohail, I am afraid, is going to bring some flak on himself for some inexplicable field placings. While the aggression he showed against Dravid was understandable -- and worthy of applause, actually -- it made no kind of sense to have his bowlers operate, almost throughout the match, with packed off side fields and little or no cover on the leg side.

Even assuming that the strategy was preconcieved, that the intention was to cramp the batsmen and deny runs, the field would -- should -- have been changed as soon as it became evident that the bowlers were not bowling the desired line. As it stood, there was untenanted acreage on the leg side, which the batsmen took full toll of. And Malik's being off the field meant that Sohail was a bowler short, thus compounding his woes.

Bottomline, one time was focussed, right through, the other not -- no prizes on offer for guessing which of the two teams won.

India are now up 7-4 in the head to head in Toronto, and this win should be a huge psychological boost for a team that would have started a touch apprehensively, missing four of its star performers. It will be interesting to see, tomorrow, how the side plays after this morale boost. Equally interesting to see the Pakistan response -- if the team's past character is anything to go by, Pakistan should come out of its corner, tomorrow, slugging with both fists.

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