da bet vitoria： To add to the English woes, their fielding was well below par and thecatching nothing short of dismal
Erapalli Prasanna07-Dec-2001India has found winning ways again; a Test win is indeed a win andnothing less just because it was achieved at home. Sourav Ganguly andhis boys need to be commended for this win, which came right after theVirender Sehwag-Mike Denness saga. This is the weakest English team tohave visited India, and they did not really put up a fight in Mohali.Having said that, the Indian team showed a lot of character to comethrough the crisis and emerge victorious.
To add to the English woes, their fielding was well below par and thecatching nothing short of dismal. The Indian batting has always beencomfortable against such type of bowling, lacking both express pace anddeceptive spin. I was impressed, though, by the way Graham Thorpe andCraig White batted in their second innings.
I sympathise with Ganguly for having gone in to a Test match with threenew medium-pacers. Ganguly must have prayed and hoped that England wonthe toss and saved him from taking a decision. As luck would have it,Ganguly himself won the toss and was asked to deal with the dilemma: tobat or not to bat? The Indian skipper opted to bowl first, which I thinkwas a defensive one, the decision made only to deprive the opposing sideof conditions that suited their bowling attack. The three new pacebowlers bowled reasonably well, and they are gaining in confidence,which augurs well for Indian cricket.As I mentioned before, this is not the strongest of the English sides tohave visited India. Their batting revolves around the opening batsmen,and they expect a lot from their skipper Nasser Hussain. I must admit,though, that this English side got better as the game progressed atMohali. They are showing signs of improvement, which is a good sign forthe remaining two Tests.I regard Nasser Hussain as a natural leader with a strong mind. He wasvery impressive in the manner in which he utilised his limited bowlingresources. It is very unfortunate that their seam bowling is not wellsupported by spin. The young off-spinner Richard Dawson is promising,but he has to develop the art of turning the ball prodigiously to besuccessful on Indian wickets. Dawson’s line erred slightly on theoffside, and there were times when he allowed Rahul Dravid to make easyruns. I am sure that the young spinner would have learnt a lot fromwatching Harbhajan Singh in action.To add to the English woes, their fielding was well below par and thecatching nothing short of dismal. The Indian batting has always beencomfortable against such type of bowling, lacking both express pace anddeceptive spin. I was impressed, though, by the way Graham Thorpe andCraig White batted in their second innings. They seemed to have gottenthe hang of Anil Kumble and Harbhajan Singh, and I expect them to play avery important role in the coming Tests. If England have to make a matchof it, their frontline batsmen must stay on and put up a tall score.Talking about spin, it was Harbhajan Singh who threw spanners into theEnglish batting in their first innings, with a clever mix of driftersand straighter ones. In the second innings, it was the much-familiarsight of Kumble causing havoc, picking up six wickets to destroyEngland. Kumble’s success can be attributed to his line and length;generally English batsmen do not read a bowler from his hand. They havea genuine weakness against such bowlers, which was well exploited by theseasoned leg-spinner.Another bright aspect to emerge from this Mohali Test is young fastbowler Tinu Yohannan. I am much impressed by his confident approach tothe game. Obviously he has the advantage of sport running in his blood,and one could make that out from his body language. Yohannan bowledextremely well and should serve Indian cricket for a long time. DeepDasgupta too is fast learning at the highest level; he has improved inleaps and bounds as a wicket-keeper and batsman. His maiden Test hundredjust went to show that he has the right temperament for batting inTests.England will have to do a lot of homework before they go in to thesecond Test match. They are up against the might of possibly the bestspin combination in contemporary cricket. This time around, however,they will be under pressure right from the word outset when JavagalSrinath, after his successes in South Africa, takes the red cherry inhis hand and runs in breathing fire.