At 3.43 p.m. on Saturday, as seamer Joginder Sharma sent Avishkar Salvi’s stump cartwheeling, Mumbai coach Chandrakant Pandit closed his register — in which he’d been making notes since morning — and went inside the team dressing room to pack his bag. His ‘champion’ wards, who had just suffered a humiliating 290-run defeat at the hands of Rest of India in Irani Trophy, followed the suit.If the discipline-loving Pandit was dejected at his team’s performance, the rest of India will be heartened at some of the performances for the Rest of India. Few were worried if Wasim Jaffar got out cheaply or Sairaj Bahutule failed to take wickets; the good news was that Parthiv Patel scored a half-century in both the innings and Zaheer Khan wielded his bat like a prized sword after bowling in tandem with SS Paul, the toofani bowler from West Bengal’s Tufanganj.Mumbai’s loss was India’s gain.A look at the teams selected for the four-day practice match between India seniors and India ‘A’ proves the point. Besides Aakash Chopra, Parthiv Patel, Zaheer Khan and Dinesh Mongia, who failed with the bat but impressed with his leadership skills, many fringe players also made it to the list after a good outing at Mohali. S Sriram made a strokeful 77 in the first innings; Gautam Gambhir’s scores of 39 and 30 were decent enough considering that he had to face the new ball in seamer-friendly conditions; Murali Kartik took only three wickets but his 56 in the first innings and 104-run partnership with Patel put Rest in the driver’s seat; SS Paul’s feat was almost — though not quite — overshadowed by Zaheer’s performance but the selectors were watching; Vizag lad Y Venugopal Rao scored the only ton of the match and Joginder Sharma deserved to be rewarded for his good length bowling. No wonder when it came to drawing out the positives from last four days of some good quality cricket, the Rest, unlike their sullen Mumbai friends, left the PCA Stadium with their hands full.ScoreboardRest of India (1st innings): 314Mumbai (1st innings): 198Rest of India (2nd innings): 378 (A Chopra 41, Y Venugapala 113, P Patel 68, Zaheer Khan 60; Salvi 3/82, Morris 2/95, Bahutule 3/92, Powar 3/92).Mumbai (2nd innings): 204 (V Mane 41, Joginder 3/40, Kartik 2/49, Golwalkar 2/24).
