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Azhar saves India's blushes

Prem Panicker

I'm not too sure if the Indian cricket team goes in much for reading the Bible. I suspect not, for they seem totally unfamiliar with the parable of the talents.

They talk tough before a Test begins, about going in with a positive attitude. Yet, each time they find themselves in a position from where a win seems the most viable option, the side goes out of its way to muck it up.

Vide Calcutta, circa 1996, versus South Africa. Vide Barbados, this year, versus the West Indies. And now, vide Colombo, versus Sri Lanka.

Three times in the recent past, a team with a collective heart slightly larger than a peanut would have gone for the win. And imagine the difference that would have made to the team's record - three more wins to show, two of them abroad. As opposed to what we have now - a defeat in the West Indies, and a draw here in Sri Lanka.

Why? Is it that months of stumbling along, from defeat to defeat, has knocked the wind out of this side, numbed its heart, dampened its will?

Or is it, simply, that nobody cares any more?

Sitting here, moments after the end of play on day five of the second and final Test against Sri Lanka at the SSC, these thoughts keep doing a route march through my mind. And at the end of it all, I must confess I have no answers.

Just how did a win slip through India's fingers in this game? Maybe a review of the day's actions will provide answers.

India went in needing 324 to win in 90 overs - a run rate of around the 3.6 mark. Impossible? No. Eminently possible. Look at the logistics. One - the wicket is the same track, in all respects, to the one on which the Lankans, the previous day, clubbed around 150-odd runs in just one session. True, that was neck or nothing slogging - but then again, here the batting side, with ten wickets in hand, merely had to amble along.

Now look at the equation a bit more closely. There really is no way that a bowling side - any bowling side - can go through an entire day, 90 full overs, and not give away at least 20 fours (Sri Lanka in fact gave away 34, but take 20 as a conservative estimate). That is 80 runs off just 3.2 deliveries, that are pretty much a given (true, before you point out, that you still have to play the strokes to get the boundaries - but hey, are we talking international cricketers here, or what?). Which then reduces the equation, further, to 244 runs needed off 86.4 overs - the kind of equation that, in an ODI situation, any side in the world would sneer at.

The reason for the above calculation is to point out that what the team needed to keep in mind, all along, was that if they kept taking singles at the rate of at least two, or three, per over, they would be home in a canter.

Blindingly obvious - to everyone, that is, but the Indian cricket team. Else how explain the play on the day?

Ajay Jadeja, who the previous evening had for once taken courage in both hands and, taking advantage of the fact that a ring of seven or eight fielders up close left large gaps in the outfield, slammed 35 runs with seven fours, this morning went into back into his shell.

Navjot Singh Sidhu, whose confidence should by rights be sky high after a 100 in the first innings, found that he had walked out with the wrong bat - the one in which the manufacturers, while providing a double portion of edges, had unfortunately omitted to include a middle.

Meanwhile, Ranatunga went defensive. His ploy, right from the morning, was to keep just two slips in place, keep one left arm seamer on at one end, first Vaas, then Sajeewa D'Silva, and have them angle the ball across the right handers. The preferred line was short of driving length, pitching on middle, angling way away from the right hander's off stump. Obviously, the Lankan skipper was counting on it to do one of two things, preferably both - one, to make it impossible for the batsmen to hit the ball and thus, drive up the required rate and two, hoping that the irritability factor involved in seeing ball after ball going through outside your stumps would prompt indiscretion.

Fell for it, did friend Sidhu. A slash at Vaas, the edge as inevitable as dawn following night, Jayasuriya diving right to hold at second slip and, in the process, make amends for the fact that he did not move, yesterday evening, to take a simple edge off the same batsman, and India had lost wicket number one.

Rahul Dravid, in a recent interview, said that he needed to work on a few areas in his batting, especially on an increased ability to work the ball around for singles. True, he is a very classical batsman. True, too, he is invaluable as an anchor, most especially in an Indian lineup prone to inexplicable collapse. But if he is to really flower in that role, he has - and that right soon - got to learn to rotate strike. This does not involve ugly heaves - you can play straight bat, in the V, and yet place the ball just that bit to left or right of a fielder and keep getting the singles at will. And if he doesn't know how, he could always ask a modern master of the art - Sunil Gavaskar, to give him a name - for tips. In the event, in this innings, Dravid pottered around for 46 deliveres, got six runs, and with Jadeja in an equally snail-like frame of mind at the other end, the period before lunch seemed like a game between two chess players, both determined to defend the heck out of each other.

Even that wouldn't have mattered if India had gone in with wickets intact - but Dravid, after getting his eye in, succumbed to a trap that was obvious as a telegraphed punch. Muralitharan bowled to him with a leg slip, a short square leg and a very short midwicket - signalling that his line would be off and middle, ball turning to leg, to feed on Dravid's penchant for stepping back and trying to flick with the turn through the on side. Sure enough, Dravid did exactly that, the inevitable edge popped down the throat of short square leg, and India had lost another wicket with nothing much to show for it.

Of course, it would be pointless to suggest that in this situation the ideal number three would have been either Azhar, whose habit of working the ball with his wrists would have ensured that the scoreboard did not become static, or Saurav Ganguly, who as a left-hander could pose some problems for the left-arm fast bowlers Ranatunga used in sequence to plug up one end. Then, Dravid could have been used to shut down shop if India ever seemed in danger of collapsing. Such strategic changes, however, have not been part of the Indian mindset, so we'll let that pass.

Sachin Tendulkar found himself in a fix. Coming in with about half an hour to go for lunch, he apparently figured on ensuring against the loss of further wickets, thinking perhaps to step on it post lunch. Fair enough. But why both Sachin and Jadeja - two of the briskest movers between wickets in this side - stayed rooted for long periods to their respective ends, perfecting their forward defensive strokes, beats me. Sachin, for instance, went in to lunch having scored just 8 off 40 deliveries - and the bowling was neither that good, nor that restrictive.

It's the procrastination syndrome, I guess. Never mind taking singles now, I can always get them after lunch! And what happens? Sachin comes back after the break, pre-determined to step on it. Murali bowls to him, this time with a packed off side field. Sachin falls for the trap, going down the wicket to try and flick over midwicket. The leading edge to the ball turning sharply balloons the ball up and the down again, into mid on's pocket - and Sajeewa D'Silva didn't even have to move to take that one.

Jadeja and Azhar then settled down to working singles, both looking in good touch. And even despite the madness of the morning, the ask rate - with 60 overs still to go - was a mere 4.4. At which point, Jadeja who, through the morning, had looked like he was posing for a painting of Patience, chased after one wide enough to have given first slip a scare, and hit it straight to point - as textbook a dismissal as you could hope to find.

Ganguly and Azharuddin then put together a partnership of 110 runs. The positive side of it was that it averted any possibility of a defeat. The negative side was that not only did Ganguly not look too actively for runs, he visibly exasperated Azhar by not running fast enough to take advantage of several occasions when the short single, or the brisk two, was very much on. So much so that at one point, Azhar first glared at his partner, then tramped down the pitch to have a word with him.

Ganguly is a peerless stroke player - silken through the off, and of late, increasingly authoritative on the on. Each of his 8 fours was a gem. But therein lies the rub. 104 balls faced. 45 runs scored. 32 of those realised off just 8 strokes. Which is as graphic an indicator of his inability to work the singles as any.

There was one over when he and Azhar climbed into Pushpakumara. Ganguly first, with two breath-taking drives through point. Then a single. Then Azhar, with two stunning drives through cover. And in the very next over, Azhar went after Muralitharan, two clinical trips down the wicket to take the bowler on the half volley and swing over long on for fours.

Apparently, Ganguly and Azhar had decided to make a go of it - with about 20 overs to go and an asking rate of 8-plus. Trouble is, though, that it is easier to go at 3-plus an over for an extended period, than it is to go at 8-plus. In the former instance, a good ball you have to defend against produces no pressure. In the latter, any ball you can't score off adds to your mental burden. And produces, inevitably, the error - Ganguly, here, found himself cramped by Murali, figured on trying to let the ball turn and then prod it past the slip to the vacant third man area, ended up getting the edge into the keeper's glove, and walked off taking any chance India had of making a go of it at that late stage with him.

Mongia and Azhar then played out time. And Azhar, in the process, completed yet another century. Interestingly, he was the only one who played the innings called for in the circumstances - if the ball could be hit, he hit, 14 of them going to the fence. And if he couldn't hit, he worked around and took singles, when his partners deigned to oblige, that is.

And there it all ended, with India pulling a draw out of the jaws of victory in its own inimitable style.

I'll leave you with a thought. Barry Richards, once, was talking about the art of chasing. His words went (and this is not an exact, verbatim quote, but the gist merely): "Assume your ask rate is four per over. Assume you get three in the first over. Then, at the start of the next over, tell yourself you are batting minus one. Say you get five. Tell yourself, okay, plus one. And so on. What this does is keeps you focussed, aware of what you have to do and what you have done, and always keeps you centered on your goal."

This was subsequently repeated by Barry in a published interview. Which a certain Mohinder Amarnath read, and adopted as one of the keystones of his own batting philosophy.

We can grouse about the team coach not being up to scratch. But there is a lot of cricketing wisdom out there, just waiting to be picked up - which reminds me, Barry Richards is in fact in Colombo, part of the television commentary team.

If you are a computer professional and want to learn while you work, you read computer books. A doctor? Medical journal. Businessman? Forbes, and such.

An Indian cricketer?

I donno. Comics?

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