Posted by   on (August 31, 2012, 3:39 GMT)

Raina is the only enterprising young batsman who looks complete for test cricket in terms of talent and technique. Badrinath is not even young and he's had some chances in which he has clearly shown that he isn't international cricket material .

Posted by   on (August 31, 2012, 3:37 GMT)

Even while your article tries to make it seem as if Suresh Raina has been the underachiever among himself, Kohli and Pujara , the fact is that Raina has played far more valuable knocks than Kohli or Pujara or both combined together ! Kohli+ Pujara have scored 2 hundreds and 4 fifties whereas Raina alone has scored 1 hundred and 6 fifties ! He was the only obstacle left for England's win at Lords . We all know that England is a far better test side than Australia now and also English conditions are way more tougher than Australian conditions . Henceforth it's a bit of a shame to point that out as a blemish in Raina's longer format abilities when even the most experienced of players who have played more than 2 test series in England before also failed. Raina is definitely far more talented than any of the other young players and he's technically very equipped as well . A fifty from Kohli and a hundred from Pujara against a feeble test team has cemented their position eh ?? Hilarious !

India will thrash NZ by an innings once again.....

Raina is a very hardworking cricketer but still, i would prefer him to concentrate on the limited over formats which comes very much naturally to him and not push him into tests and make him do something which doesn't come to him that fluently. We do have Rahane who is technically and temperamentally better than Raina for llonger format. And with Viru expressing desire to come into middle order on retirement of stalwarts, why not move him to no.5 and have Rahane opening the innings? Atleast they can test in home games.

Against a "feeble New Zealand" aye??? Words like that can come back and hurt you Siddarth Ravindran. I hope they do on this occasion, at times NZ can pull out a big game - Hobart last year is a prime example. If we can just get some runs and hold our catches. Our fielding was overshadowed by our terrible batting in the last test, but it was equally terrible, we need to hold our catches and support the bowlers working hard in trying conditions. If you can take a positive from the hiding we got in test one, it would've been for me the way the attack never gave up. So let's go "feeble New Zealand" and produce an upset --- pleasssssse, at least don't get thrashed again.

Well, all loyal NZ fans know our side reserves their best performances for when they are completely written off by everyone (see Hobart, 2011). If the batsmen can cobble together 300 per innings and Tim and Trent can get a couple each early on, it'll be game on. Come on, Kiwis!

CoorparoMaverick Bradman - sure, Sobers, Kallis - arguable considering batting - they were/are peerless allrounders. Pollock? Which one ? (not Shaun please) .

Team INDIA will win this series

The NZ media have reported that there will be one chance with Southeee coming in, possibly for Bracewell. No Nethula. Regardless of which bowlers they switch round the message appears to be one of fail as a batsman and you'll be given plenty of chances, fail as bowler (and none of them went wicketless but thanks to the batsmen only got one chance to bowl) and you are gone. Personally I think at present you can make a strong argument for an extra bowler in preference to a batsman. If your batters can only get you 160 tops in each innings then dropping one will have minimal effect. Your only slight chance is to stack your bowling and hope they can keep you in the game.

we shud never play test matches in bangalore which doesn't assist spinners.test matches shud be played only in mumbai,kokata,delhi and chennai.