Finally, India enjoy J-class comfort

Finally, over a minute after tea, when he walked back to the pavilion after making probably one of the most valuable contributions by a batsman for Team India on this tour, you couldn’t help but ask this question, once again. Where is he headed, back into that zone?

Of course, there was Wasim Jaffer coming good at the other end with a great century, the first by an Indian of this series. But it was Kaarthick’s 63 in that 153-run opening partnership with Jaffer, the best ever for India in South Africa, that has really set up this match for India and their Day 1 total of 254 for three.

Simply because the day’s battle was over by lunchtime when India walked back at 61 for no loss.

Unsure whether he will play, then asked to open in the crucial deciding game of a tense Test series, the 21-year-old came up with the kind of steel that has not been seen before by an Indian batsman on this tour. He also opened a new window to the future: will India now have to seriously think of playing him more in Tests, and Dhoni in one-dayers?

Managing talent has never been an Indian speciality. But Kaarthick has the technique, as he showed this morning against Makhaya Ntini, Dale Steyn and the master of them all, Shaun Pollock. He has the temperament, fitting quite nicely into the role of anchorman, playing out time, playing down ball after ball with that straight, broad bat. He has the strokes, too, as those offdrives and a classic squarecut off Harris showed. And he surely is a better keeper than Dhoni.

But what he obviously lacks is the famous Dhoni eye, the flamboyant shots, the 0-50 in nine seconds kind of pick-up. Well, this is one call that has to be taken very soon or, it’s back to the zone again for Kaarthick, another talent gone down the drain.

Clawing back from the drain, meanwhile, was Jaffer, hitting the big one when it mattered most to ensure that Team India would not pull the chain on a batting beauty. In fact, the joke doing the rounds here this evening, as India sailed past the 200-mark, is that groundsman Bennet Hewe is being offered an honorary Indian citizenship — even Jaffer called it an Indian wicket.

But South African skipper Graeme Smith was not laughing, not on a day when Team India crossed 250 in one day, something they had not done in a full innings in the last two Tests. Smith would also be kicking himself after dropping the easiest of slip catches, letting Kaarthick get away with it on 32, India at 95 for no loss.

To rub it in, rookie left-arm spinner Paul Harris, who on a normal day might struggle to make it to a Ranji team, had started to turn the ball by late afternoon, hinting at what’s to come in the last innings. Did anyone see Anil Kumble rubbing his hands in the team balcony? Did you see Harbhajan Singh sinking his head into his palms, having lost a great chance to make a mark in South Africa, done in by a bizarre decision to retain Virender Sehwag as the second spinner.

But at the end of it all, Dravid gone for a quick 29, with a flurry of shots on both sides of the wicket, Sachin Tendulkar yet to hit the stride, you simply had to bow your head in front of Jaffer.

Without that superb six-hour 244-ball effort, India could still have stumbled — even on this flat surface, even without Andre Nel to contend with. But the Mumbai opener took them happily along, in an innings that was all about the two C-words: class, which has been the theme of his three hundreds over the last 10 months, and character, for coming back from a horrible run of scores on this tour.

He almost gave it away within the first 30 minutes, like he did in Durban, with a never-never hook shot that nearly landed in fine-leg’s hands. But from then on, Jaffer was the man — two back-to-back fours off Ntini only confirmed it, one steered delicately, the other pulled savagely.

Steyn was the next in line, dispatched through midwicket, and Smith had thrown up his hands by the 10th over, dismantling his slip cordon, deploying sweepers on both sides of the wicket. Pollock made no big difference, and Jacques Kallis, probably the best bowler on the day, was played down with caution. No wonder, the wide-eyed Harris was called in after just the 22nd over of the match.

Crossing his 50 with an ondrive off Pollock that went under a diving Ntini at mid-on, Jaffer stayed the course after lunch, first taking Harris apart, then giving another dose to Ntini and Co. But just when he looked like he would do a repeat of that famous 212 in Antigua last July, he hung his bat out with just five overs to go, nudging Steyn to Kallis at second slip.

Still, a great effort, a great day for India, their first batting day out on this tour. Laxman has just pulled out that famous flick off the hips, Tendulkar is nodding his head at the other end. Two more sessions like this, and the series will be within handshaking distance.