Dravid is his own man, but has much to do

Only a faint-hearted captain might hand his coach the reins of the team, and all evidence of Dravid is to the contrary, writes Rohit Brijnath, in the Sportstar.

Fact is, of course, that neither experimentation, nor order shuffling, is the cause of India's recent woes. Merely that lately the batting has had more cracks in it than a Bush argument. In their last 10 innings, India's batsmen, from Dravid (105, 11, 0, 15, 18, 9*, 26, 6, 0, 7) to Raina (6, 7*, 27, 26, 7, 2, 34, 1*, 11, 26) to Dhoni (3, 59, 18, 2, 15, 46*, 14, 2, 18, 23) to Yuvraj (4, 63*, 7, 24, 12, 93, 52, 26, 0, 0) to Sehwag (73, 22, 12, 97, 11, 95, 9, 8, 10) to Pathan (46, 1*, 26, 7*, 1, 14, 1, 8, 64, 0), have been edgy.

Apart from the strains of leading the side through a critical phase, there is pressure on Rahul Dravid to deliver as a batsman, writes S Dinakar in the same magazine.

Frank Tyson believes Sachin Tendulkar should examine Don Bradman's post-WW II figures and take inspiration from them.

At the moment Tendulkar is at a comparable stage of his international career as Bradman found himself on the Australian tour of England in 1948. At this juncture "the Don" was 40 — eight calendar years older than the Little Mumbai Master. But in terms of playing experience, both men were on a par. Bradman lost eight years of cricket to the Second World War; Each suffered injury: Bradman to a gym accident as an Army Physical Education Instructor and Tendulkar to his lingering tennis elbow.