Planning should start now, not tomorrow

Does this mean there is a particular reason why India, in the middle of their summer where temperatures are so high as to be a health hazard, are forced to tour the island in July and August? Pre-season activity at home is low on the list of priorities unless it is fitness training.

Since 1999 though, Sri Lanka have had a run of remarkable success against India by scheduling tours and limited overs series between June and September. It was once suggested by a former coach, Dav Whatmore, that it suited Sri Lanka to host such mid-year tours.

Not only does it keep the pool of international players aware of fitness needs, it also creates a mid-year following among spectators who would otherwise have sports of lesser intellectual standing to entertain them. Anyway, rugby, tennis and golf are seen as elitist among the lesser income groups. And soccer attracts only a hooligan element.

Not only have India, since 1999, been elbow-jolted aside by Sri Lanka. Others have also fallen into the mid-year syndrome trap; lack of preparation. Apart from Pakistan in 2000 and New Zealand in 2003 (and that was April and May), Sri Lanka have a near 100 percent home record.

In 2000, Pakistan won the Test series 2-0 with the Kandy venue awash from the monsoon deluge. A month later, South Africa were more fortunate at Asgiriya. Although well beaten in a triangular limited overs series final late July, the Safs under Shaun Pollock did enough to level the series.

As Safs coach in 2000 Graham Ford said at the time, touring Sri Lanka (out of our season) calls for a seriously different approach. The main gripe is about climate changes, of bowlers learning to get the right line and length on varying surfaces, coping with adjustments to batting techniques. It is a complaint you hear all the time from touring captains when they lose.

Ford did not complain. After the triangular final and heavy defeat in the Galle Test, he went looking for answers and while not fully satisfied with the results, agreed to tour Sri Lanka needed a lot of pre-tour preparation.

Eric Simons learnt the hard way last year and lost his job as coach because of general poor pre-tour management planning input. You would have thought the Safs would have had enough savvy by now to sort out how to handle such conditions. It was typical of the Simons/Graeme Smith partnership, a show of arrogance that seriously backfired on the team and impacted on his career.

Now, had India toured Zimbabwe before their triangular series back here in July and August, it might have been a different story. But it was a tough journey for Greg Chappell first time up. He knew it as well. Always polite and often self-effacing when facing earlier media briefings, he was left like so many others, looking for answers to the problem. A couple of low-key practice matches are not going to help.

This was the view of Mike Procter, coach of the Safs in Sri Lanka in 1993. He admitted that winning the series 1-0 was a genuine bonus. Test and limited overs games were mixed up. The limited overs was shared 1-1.

The tourists played two tough three-day pre-tour games in early August and studied the opposition with the hard-nosed Kepler Wessels in charge as captain. South Africa then had the sort of highly combustible bowlers to rattle as many ribs as helmets. Allan Donald, Brett Schultz, Brian McMillan presented a formidable pace and seam trio with wily Pat Symcox as the main spin option.

While Chappell, with the Zimbabwe experience in mind, Team India will be seriously looking at some payback as Sri Lanka tackle their first limited overs series in India this century. And in a nation where there is genuine passion for the game not the lip service you get in Colombo.

Conditions for most tourists will be new and if Chappell and Sourav Ganguly sensibly do their homework, the defeats that have rankled Indian captains and coaches since 1999, will at least be put into perspective.

What perspective though remains to be seen. It is time for Team India to gel; planning should start now, not tomorrow.