India pulls it back on day two

Prem Panicker

While the Hooper-Lara blitz was on in the post-tea session yesterday, I was mentioning in course of the ball by ball commentary that this is the sort of wicket batsmen salivate, and bowlers shudder, over.

One of the people in the chat room, at that point, remarked that the pitch would look flat when the Windies were batting, but when Ambrose and Walsh got going it would be a different proposition altogether.

There's a bit of truth in there, actually. Not that the wicket would do more for the Windies quicks - but that they are faster through the air, so if they bowl a full length, then it would be possible to compensate to some extent for the flat nature of the pitch at Sabina Park.

Well, day two certainly stymied that doubt - the pitch played true to its featherbed fashion, and given that, India can be reckoned to have done well to have first got out the remaining six West Indies wickets for just 120 runs, after the first four had added 300, and then replying with 108/1 at stumps on day two.

Here's the how of it...

First session

The Windies opened the day with Carl Hooper batting 87 and Ian Bishop, playing nightwatchman, batting 3. And given the way Bishop negotiated Prasad, Kuruvilla and Kumble in the first over, finding all the time in the world to guide the ball around and occasionally thumping the loose deliveries for more, it looked like not only Hooper, but even Bishop, would go on to a big score. The fifth wicket, thus, added 67 runs before Bishop (24 off 71 with two fours) got a shade over-ambitious, and tried to hit a well tossed up one from Anil Kumble out of Sabina Park. In the event, he only managed a bit of wood on it, the ball swerved up and Joshi, at mid off, took a well judged catch (Windies 357/5).

Hooper, meanwhile, had got to his 100 in clinical style, and looked to be middling the ball with absolute ease. Which is why, taken in conjunction with the comfortable scoreline, it is rather hard to understand why he choose to play unduly defensive on this wicket. Sure, he could have been looking to go on to a really mammoth score, but the obvious way to have got there was by playing his strokes, which is what he does best. In the event, he pushed and prodded in rather uncharacteristic fashion before misjudging a good slower ball from Kuruvilla to pop a drive played too early straight to Prasad at mid on. (Hooper 129 off 212 with 17 fours, Windies 368/6).

Junior Murray came in, watched while, at the other end, Azharuddin uncharacteristically put down a slip chance off Kumble's bowling, the ball taking the outer edge of Holder's tentative bat. And in his own turn, poked around for three deliveries before going back to the Kumble flipper and getting it on the pad, plumb in front. (Murray 1 off 4, Windies 7/370).

That was the score at lunch, which was taken at the fall of the seventh wicket, and India must have been well pleased with the morning's work. The bowlers didn't do anything outstanding - merely bowled a straight line, made the batsmen play at everything, and waited for the inevitable mistakes.

A word, though, about Kumble - between yesterday and today, some hard thinking must have been done by the leggie. On day one, he kept pushing them through flat and fast, as he did throughout the RSA tour. Today, however, he tried flighting a few in his first over, found the batsmen tentative, and promptly began giving the ball lots more air. The result, he looked a totally different proposition - the flighted balls turned and beat the bat, and the quick flipper and top spinner mixed things up, keeping the batsmen tentative.

Post lunch session

The Windies lower order, unlike say that of RSA, are not packed with all-rounders who can get big scores. But the thing with the likes of Ambrose is that they love batting, they get their kicks out of throwing the bat around a bit and this track was tailormade for that kind of batting. With the result that while debutant Roland Holder, the man who replaced Jimmy Adams in the lineup, pushed and poked the ball around, Ambrose swung lustily, missing some, connecting others, and beaming his trademark grin when the ball disappeared into the country. While it is always frustrating for a fielding side to see the tail wag merrily, the Indian bowlers, Joshi and Kumble, wouldn't have minded the slogs from Ambrose, given that he looked like getting out any minute. In the event, he played the one slog too many, the extra pace of the flipper defeated him and the resultant edge swirled out on the off for Ganguly, at point, to dive forward and hold well. (Ambrose 23 off 40 with three fours, Windies 408/8).

An incident needs passing mention here - when Ambrose was in single figures, he poked at one from Kumble outside off, got an edge, saw Azhar lean forward and grab it and started walking. Azhar promptly stopped the batsman, then signalled to the umpire that he hadn't taken it clean. On replay, the ball looked to have just fractionally grazed the turf as Azhar's fingers closed around it, but too marginally for the umpire to have seen it. And given that Ambrose had already begun walking back, the verdict would have been obvious if Azhar had not called the batsman back. Nice to see players still capable of playing cricket as a game, rather than a win-at-all-costs affair.

Holder has an impressive record, something like four fifties and a hundred, in domestic cricket this year. But in the event, he looked rather uneasy out there especially against Kumble, never quite clear where the ball was going or what it was likely to do. And with Joshi too tossing the ball right up and inviting drives that somehow never quite came up, Holder was one unhappy camper for the 73 balls his innings of 17 lasted, till he tried to cut at a top spinner outside off stump, was beaten by the speed of the ball off the wicket, and ended up under-edging, for Azhar to take a good one low down in the slips. (Windies 423/9).

Franklyn Rose, another debutant, was meanwhile enjoying himself in front of his home crowd, batting with assurance on a wicket where the ball came on slow enough for him to pick and choose which gap he would push it into. Courtney Walsh, the last man, however has never made any bones about the fact that his idea of batting - unless the situation is a back to the wall fight, is to either push forward defensively, or slog heartily, without reference to line or length.

Thus, we were treated to the comical sight of the Windies captain playing an immaculate forward defensive push at a half volley, and following up with a hefty, but fruitless, slog at a much better ball. Walsh's antics were greeted by huge roars from his adoring home crowd, but the fun was short-lived as Kumble produced the most logical ball - dead straight, and on the stumps - and Walsh (4 off 11, with one four) swiped, missed, heard the rattle of timber behind him and strode off briskly, seemingly content with a job well done. All good clean fun, but it left Rose stranded on a well made 14 off 21 balls with two fours, both nice, stylish strokes through the off.

For the Indians, Kumble (42.4-5-120-5) got five of the six to fall on the day while Kuruvilla (30-6-82-3) capped an impressive debut on an unhelpful track by getting the big one, that of Hooper. The others, Joshi (27-6-81-1) and Prasad (28-5-104-1) in particular, bowled well, keeping a tidy line and length and making the batsmen work for runs - which is about all that any bowler can do on a track like this.

The Windies innings ended at the score of 427 in 134.4 overs, which meant that India, on day two, had got six wickets for 127 runs in 44.4 overs.

V V S Laxman, upped from the lower middle order to the number one berth, came out to open with Navjot Singh Sidhu, making his first appearance for India after the walkout in England in March last year, and their first task was to play out 20 minutes to tea.

First up, Ambrose bent his back really hard to surprise Laxman with one that kicked up off a length, to take the splice of the bat and lob in the air but just short of gully.

Then the big fast bowler got Sidhu nicking at one, the edge falling just ahead of Brian Lara at slip, but close enough to have been taken had the fielder reacted faster.

Then Bishop, whose first spell was rather wayward, produced one good ball that seamed in sharply, took the inner edge and flashed over the stumps and to the left of keeper Junior Murray. It was a nice catchable height, Murray lunged and, goalkeeper fashion, parried the ball away instead, and three clear chances had gone unclaimed in the first three overs, with India's score reading just two.

The two, however, managed to last out the remainder of the time till tea, to go in with the score reading 10/0 - which looked far better than 2/2. And again, the Windies seemed to be suffering from their biggest drawback - being less than 100 per cent in the field.

Post tea session

After the break, the two openers seemed to have got over the initial jitters, and Laxman in particular looked to be gaining in confidence as he began getting right behind the line of everything and middling both his defensive and aggressive strokes.

Sidhu, meanwhile, showed the rust of his long layoff. Playing mostly with the bat away from the body, he defended stoutly and when a widish ball outside off sat up and begged for treatment, he played a confident cut that speared the ball to the point fence for four. However, just when he seemed to be getting his eye in, he went half-cock forward to a fullish length ball from Bishop, and was taken on the pads. Watch the replay enough times, and you'll begin suspecting that the drift was taking the ball down the leg side - but the element of doubt was marginal at best, and in the event, the breaks went against Sidhu (10 off 33 with one four) to have India at 32/1.

It must be added, here, that after a layoff of almost a year, one innings is way too little to judge Sidhu's current form on - he has been picked as the regular opener, and needs to be played for two, three Tests and given a chance to find his rhythm again before the final verdict is written on this comeback.

Rahul Dravid meanwhile joined Laxman at the wicket, and went runless for 29 deliveries. But if that statistic sounds indicative of tentative batting, nothing like it - apparently the India number three had either been instructed, or had determined for himself, that he should anchor the innings. And so Dravid set about guaging the pace of the wicket, leaving everything even marginally outside the stumps, defending the ones on good line and middling the ball right through.

Laxman, meanwhile, grew visibly in confidence and as the ball lost its shine and the bowlers their steam, began stroking the ball with a calm assurance that should have had Sachin Tendulkar sighing in relief. And together, these two saw off Ambrose, Bishop, Walsh and Rose - and forced the Windies skipper to try a bit of spin via Carl Hooper.

At which point, Dravid went into overdrive. In Hooper's first over, what looked like a gentle push on the off side was so well timed as to leave the field standing en route to the fence. In the next over, Dravid repeated the off drive, this time playing it with full follow through, then followed up with a square drive played on one knee, and finished up with a lovely cover drive off the front foot, and spin had proved as ineffective as pace.

And that was pretty much the story of the remaining overs, as the two batsmen played the ball on merit, adding 98 runs in the session for the loss of Sidhu's wicket and never once looking in any trouble against any of the bowlers on view.

For the Windies, Ambrose and Walsh showed their class on the rare occasions when they really bent their backs and made the odd one stand up even from this dead track. Walsh, in fact, once slipped in a beauty of a bouncer that pitched on off, lifted, and cut back in at Laxman - but the batsman had enough time, even then, to rock back out of harm's way, and Walsh figured, like Ambrose before him, that bouncing was a waste of energy, and settled down to keeping the ball on length and line and waiting for the mistakes - which, in the event, didn't come.

Rose, the debutant, is pretty much a product of the Windies fast bowling factory - straight and easy run up, high arm action, smooth delivery stride, pacy through the air and very accurate. Bishop, after his first wayward spell of two overs, switched ends and promptly settled down to some steady bowling, while Chanderpaul, given four overs at the end as Walsh tried to get through the quota of overs, was so far outside off stump that most times, the batsmen were reduced to spectators as bowler and keeper shuttled the ball back and forth between them. C'paul was in fact flighting well, and getting some turn, as was Hooper - but if, as seems likely, the two part-time spinners have to bowl long spells tomorrow, they will need to get the ball a lot closer to the stumps and make the batsmen play. But for that, the overnight notouts have to bat out the first hour of tomorrow's session and see off Ambrose and Walsh all over again - and on whether or no they do that could well hinge the key to the remainder of the Indian innings.