It’s yesterday once more

Saturday was a nice change from the recent past, when India’s batsmen have flunked and the bowlers have had small targets to bowl at. B...

Saturday was a nice change from the recent past, when India’s batsmen have flunked and the bowlers have had small targets to bowl at. But the result was not too different. While the batsmen piled up a defendable 292, the bowlers appeared ill-equipped to do any damage to the Pakistani batsmen, taking the scenario back to the old days when the toothless Indian bowling attack would undo the good work of the batsmen in match after match. Here are some thoughts on setting the bowling attack on track

Why Nehra?

Picking Ashish Nehra ahead of Agarkar was baffling, especially because Nehra offered little variety to an attack already employing two left-armers, Irfan Pathan and Zaheer Khan. The injury-prone Nehra hasn’t played much cricket in recent times, and came into the game with just a Ranji Trophy game against Gujarat as preparation. Agarkar, if nothing else, could have changed the angle of delivery and provided a bit of variety.

Ditto for the spin attack

Picking Harbhajan Singh — while admitting that he is probably India’s best spin bet at the moment — also didn’t help, because he took the ball away from the left-handed Salman Butt, as did the three left-arm seamers. Ditto for Virender Sehwag and his fastish off-breaks. Kumble would have turned the ball the other way, again providing the variety necessary. The leg-spinner at India’s disposal, Sachin Tendulkar, was introduced as late as the 38th over.

Filling the Balaji gap

Story continues below this ad

With Laxmipathy Balaji — one of the heroes in India’s one-day series triumph in Pakistan earlier this year — absent injured, it was necessary that the think-tank showed a bit of creativity to fill in the gap. Balaji played in all the five one-dayers in Pakistan and showed that a bit of variety in the pace attack always helps the cause of the team. He would tighten up one end with his incoming deliveries and also learnt to move the ball away from the right-hander as the tour progressed. Thus proving the ideal foil for Irfan Pathan.

Class is permanent

As has been said before, if Kumble is not going to be in the XI, there is no real point in picking him in the squad. He has an awesome one-day record and Kolkata has been one of his more successful hunting grounds; remember the 6 for 12 against West Indies in the Hero Cup final in 1993-94?