Just when you thought things couldn’t get worse for the touring Indians, they did today. After being humiliated by a Victoria team earlier this week, the tourists met a similar fate against a second-string Queensland side on the opening day of a three-day game here today and cast further doubts that they would be able to bowl out Australia twice in the Tests. After the bowlers conceded 304 runs for six wickets, the Indian batting crumbled to 17 for 3 at close against a Queensland Academy of Sports XI. Scoreboard Queensland (1st Innings): C Simpson c&b Agarkar 43, D Payne lbw Pathan 0, L Carsledine c Dasgupta b Kumble 112, A Nye c&b Kumble 15, C Philipson st Dasgupta b Kumble 85, S Farrell lbw Kumble 9, C Hartley n.o. 21, R Loux n.o. 5, Extras (b-4, lb-1, w-2, nb-7) 14, Total (For 6 wkts, 81 overs) 304 Fall of wickets: 1-4, 2-65, 3-137, 4-222, 5-256, 6-283 Bowling: Agarkar 18-4-73-1, Pathan 17-2-70-1, Balaji 11-3-36-0, Ganguly 4-0-16-0, Kumble 26-4-74-4, Sehwag 5-0-30-0. Indians (Ist Innings): A Chopra c Carseldine b Bryant 0, V Sehwag c Hartley b Dawes 6, D Dasgupta lbw Bryant 0, Laxman batting 1, S Ganguly batting 5, Extras (lb-5) 5, Total (For 3 wkts, 7 overs) 17 Fall of wickets: 1-7, 2-7, 3-11 Bowling: Joe Dawes 4-1-10-1, Scott Bryant 3-2-2-2. So depleted was the Queensland team that the match was not accorded a first class status. Both teams were allowed to rotate their 12 players during the match, though only 11 could bat. The humiliation was all-round: n Lee Carseldine, playing his first game of the season after recovering from a knee injury, smashed a brilliant century n The Indians misfielded, overthrew and dropped catches n The home team cheekily declared at 304 for 6, half an hour before close of play n They then backed their decision sensationally, removing Indian openers and wicketkeeper Deep Dasgupta in the space of seven balls There were some positives, though. One was the attacking field that India maintained throughout Queensland’s innings. Another was Dasgupta’s keeping — his concentration was still good at the fag end of a hot day when he made a difficult stumping look easy against in-form Craig Philipson. Anil Kumble picked up four wickets but neither he nor any other Indian bowler looked particularly threatening on a placid pitch with short boundaries and a fast outfield. Carsledine walked in to bat in the second over of the day and stayed till well after the tea break, when he was smartly caught by Dasgupta. When Dasgupta stumped Craig Philipson, he was on 85 and looking good to be the second centurion of the day for the hosts. His innings included a towering six off Kumble when he came down the track and lifted the leg-spinner right to the sightscreen. Carseldine, who topped for Queensland last season with 709 runs at 44.31, made 112 from four hours and 190 deliveries, hitting 15 fours and a six. He looked in extremely good touch as he hit through the line and mostly with the full face of the bat. He is better known as someone who broke all of Michael Bevan’s fitness records in the Australian Cricket Academy recently. Things didn’t get any better when India came in to bat. Scott Bryant, a left-arm paceman, removed Akash Chopra and Deep Dasgupta off successive deliveries in his second over. Then Virender Sehwag edged a flick down the legside off Joe Dawes for wicketkeeper Chris Hartley to take.(PTI)
