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Even stevens in third Test

New Zealand all out 308; India 148/5 declared; Kiwis 21/0 in 13 overs at close

Within minutes of India bowling New Zealand out and then opting not to enforce the follow on, I got five mails, ranging in tone from the puzzled to the intemperate.

In sum, the e-mails suggested that Tendulkar was a wimp, that he didn't have faith in his bowlers, he didn't think they could bowl the Kiwis out under 275, he didn't realise that even if the Kiwis had managed to top that score in the second innings, the Indians could have gone out, thrown their bats around and knocked off whatever was needed to win, that the Indian attitude of abject defeatism sucks big time, and so on and so forth.

I am not sure I agree.

Had the Indians taken out the last four within an hour or so of start of play and then opted not to enforce the follow on, I'd have agreed that it was criminally stupid.

In other words, I think this day's play was about time -- not runs.

But the fact is that the Kiwis batted on for 40.4 overs this morning. 47 overs still needed to be bowled (deducting the mandatory two for change of innings). The main strike bowlers, Srinath and Kumble, had already sent down 35 and 48 respectively in heat-wave conditions. And the pitch continued to play benign pater familias to batsmen prepared to stay out there.

Would you, under the circumstances, ask your bowlers to come right back out and bowl at least a dozen overs apiece? Would you, with a tour of Australia coming up, run your bowlers -- especially Srinath -- into the ground, that too when given the pitch conditions, it was by no means certain that you could force a win? More so, given that the series has already been won?

Would the bowlers, under the circumstances, have been able to keep their edge going? If they could not -- and anyone who has tried playing cricket in those temperatures will tell you just what bowling a four, five over spell takes out of you -- then it would mean the Kiwi top order would have been allowed to settle down, making the job harder still.

Given that, the sensible ploy seemed to be to come out for a bit, throw your bat around mainly with a view to letting the bowlers catch their breath, freshen up, then return late in the evening for a quick burst at the Kiwis.

To return to the game, yet again the Kiwi middle and latter order gave their presumed betters a lesson in batsmanship. Astle continued his dogged defence, Cairns sloughed off his dourness of the day before and blossomed out into free flowing strokeplay, the Indians remained stuck in the rut of Prasad-Kumble followed by Srinath-Harbajan -- why oh why would you, with a new ball, want a leg spinner to bowl the first over when you could instead pair two seam bowlers together?

Events thus dragged on through the morning, the occasional wicket relieving the monotony of watching pointless play on a placid track. Prasad took out the obdurate Astle, thanks to a fine take by Ganguly at slip, and the Kiwi resistance effectively ended when Cairns, leaning back to cut Kumble from too close to off stump -- a rather injudicious piece of shot selection, that -- managed to chop it back onto his stumps.

Rudi Koertzen spoilt what was otherwise a very good Test for him by giving Wiseman -- a long way forward trying to sweep off the line of off stump -- out LBW, to a ball that would have clearly spun past leg stump to end the New Zealand innings; presumably, the umpire was as bored with the proceedings as the Indian team looked, at that stage.

Then came the famous decision to bat again rather than enforce the follow on. Tendulkar sparkled briefly, a delicate nudge to the third man fence being the standout shot in a brief tenure before he tried to whip an full length incutter to leg and got bowled playing all round it. Batsmen then came and went, in no particular order, till Ganguly in a superb cameo provided something for the puzzled crowd to cheer about, twice lifting Vettori clean over the ropes.

India's gameplan -- pretty obvious, judging by the way Vijay Bharadwaj was reduced to playing messenger boy, bringing out gloves, bats and suchlike no one seemed to want, and relaying the latest from the dressing room to the men in the middle -- was obviously to have to bowl just a dozen overs at the Kiwis in the evening.

Thus overs remaining, not runs scored or lead acquired, was always going to be the point, and Tendulkar applied the closure after the side had batted through 32 overs (in the process, scoring 149 superfluous runs).

India got 13 overs at the New Zealanders in the evening -- and despite the plethora of appeals (most of them a triumph of hope over experience), the Kiwis predictably survived. Even Tendulkar tried a few leg breaks towards the close, getting turn sure enough, but without producing anything alarming enough to send the batsmen hunting for cover.

With a day's play left in this Test, the result is pretty inevitable. Fans harking back tothe last time a Test was played here, when Srinath ran through the South African side to pull off a win, are liable to be disappointed -- this track, and that one, are poles apart in the kind of help it provides bowlers.

I remember ending my preview of this Test with one line: "Put it this way -- if the Kiwis can score 300 or more in their first innings, it is hard to see this Test ending in a result."

The point was that had the Kiwis topped 300+, they would have done better with the bat than at any point earlier in the series; in the process they would have used up a lot of overs -- and under the circumstances, the draw seemed the most likely option.

After four days of largely pointless cricket, I don't see any reason to change that opinion, do you?

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