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Rahul Dravid played another gem, and is now equally at ease at both forms of the game
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In the end India's victory over Pakistan at Kochi was a surprisingly
resounding one, considering that they would have rated their chances at no
more than even at the interval after a somewhat sloppy batting performance
in which two men did all the work in heat so sapping that it demanded a
greater collective effort. But Pakistan batted in an even more slapdash
manner after the break and gave away their wickets on a platter, and the
double-hundred partnership put up by Virender Sehwag and Rahul Dravid
earlier in the day found its just reward in a comprehensive victory.
In fact, the first 35 overs of the Indian innings seemed to offer up some
portents of the immediate future of the Indian team in one-day cricket.
Sachin Tendulkar and Sourav Ganguly, who were dismissed off successive
balls in the second over of the day, used to be India's best ODI batsmen
but are no longer so. And Dravid and Sehwag, who delivered India to safety
from 4 for 2, are in line to take over that mantle.
Sehwag had a very poor year in one-dayers in 2004, averaging just 25.80
and making only five fities in 27 games, something which had an adverse
effect on the team's performance. But here, after a lucky escape before he
had scored, he successfully applied the method he used with such success
in the recent Test series, in which his shot selection was better than it
has ever been and he was willing to bide his time for short periods and
give good bowling its due. The bowlers have to earn his wicket now, and it
is proving to be very hard work. It is possible, then, that this innings
from Sehwag will signal a resurrection in India's form in the ODIs, which has been woeful since the series victory on the tour of Pakistan last April.
And as for Dravid, he has, to use a phrase that carries some resonance in
an Indian cricketing context, taken the staircase rather than the elevator
in working out his game in one-dayers, but there is no doubt that he
is now easily equal to its demands. With VVS Laxman's departure from the
team he has gone one place higher up the order, and now that he is no
longer keeping wicket he is perfectly suited to controlling the second
half of the innings from No. 4.
What was most laudable about Dravid's innings was his masterful placement
and his rotation of the strike. He is not a natural striker of the
ball like Sehwag and cannot dismiss bowling from his presence in quite the
same manner, but by deft touches and placements he managed to keep both
his own score ticking along as well as give Sehwag plenty of the strike.
Some of the purest moments of pleasure in the day came when, in one over from Abdul Razzaq, he first dropped the ball at his feet on the off side and ran a short single, then again dropped the
ball well short of midwicket and ran another single, and then, off the
last ball of the over, deflected the ball just wide of point's left hand
for two. These things can be as for bowlers as a shower of
fours and sixes.
The other big contribution of the day came from Sachin Tendulkar, who
replicated his five-for at Kochi in a game against Australia in 1998 with
another spell of clever legspin liberally laced with appalling
full-tosses and long-hops. Tendulkar's bowling from round the wicket - which he
first perfected in the Asia Cup last year, in which he took plenty of
wickets - is so useful that it might be true to say (though it sounds like
a massive heresy) that he is worth his place in the side in one-day
cricket for his bowling alone. Especially crucial was the wicket of
Inzamam-ul-Haq, who was looking as he if was thinking of bigger things.
Tendulkar, who was dimissed three times by Shahid Afridi in the recent
Test series, showed that he had learnt a thing or two from Afridi by
firing in a quicker ball that beat Inzamam all ends up and clipped his
off bail. Now both sides possess a bowler whose change of pace is up
rather than down.
Pakistan did not help their cause with a couple of perplexing decisions
that they should rethink for the next game at Vishakapatnam. One, they did
an injustice to Danish Kaneria, who took 19 wickets in the Test series and
can land it on a spot as well as any other spinner in world cricket, by
picking Mohammad Hafeez ahead of him, and this had its effect when there
was nobody to seriously test Sehwag and Dravid after the opening bowlers
had gone off. And two, after the damage that Afridi did in the Test series
- especially the psychological stronghold he gained with his fifty in the
second innings at Bangalore, the fastest by a Pakistani batsman in Tests -
it was a huge error to make Kamran Akmal open the batting, and leave
Afridi as low down as No. 8. It is no use having good cards if one will
not play them properly.
One selection decision made by India also seemed to go against all common
sense, and yet inexplicably worked. It seemed foolish to play three fast
bowlers in the furnace-like environment of Kochi, and Pakistan began so
comfortably against the new-ball attack that it looked like India might
rue this move. But then the seamers struck three times in three overs, and
when Zaheer Khan pulled off an outstanding return catch to dismiss Yousuf
Youhana it was the beginning of the end for Pakistan. Sourav Ganguly
cannot at the moment find a run to save his life, but his instincts as
captain still seem to be in pretty good shape, and they have brought him a
result that will give him a little breathing space as he looks to work his
way out of his batting woes.
Chandrahas Choudhury is a staff writer with Wisden Asia Cricket.