With all the hype surrounding the
India-England series and the Indian media portraying the series as a grudge
series, it is disappointing that the talk of the town has been about the nature
of the pitches rather than about some engrossing cricket which has been played
over the last two weeks.
A lot of talk has taken place
about the extent of home advantage a team must have. I believe that’s where the
beauty of test cricket lies, the different challenges one has to face when
travelling to different countries is what makes cricket a very unique and
intriguing sport. There have been times when spinning tracks have been ruled as
unsporting and I find that pretty absurd since a green top is considered as a
fair wicket. A track which turns from day one can be considered as unsporting
only when the result of the game is highly dependent on the toss. A track can
be considered as sporting when it favours both batsmen and bowlers equally. It
has almost become a norm these days that if a bowler’s track is laid out, it is
considered as a bad track, but on the other hand if it is a batsman’s paradise,
no one seems to make a fuss about it.
That’s where I feel Dhoni’s unyielding request for tracks which have turn
and bounce right from day one is a wonderful step in order to change the state
of wickets which are prepared in India. For most part of the last decade, there
have been way too many flat tracks which have been prepared leading to high
scoring draws. As we saw in Mumbai, the toss was taken out of the equation, the
spinners got turn and bounce from day one, fast bowlers found carry as good as one
can get in India, Pietersen and Cook showed there was good value for your shots
once you get in. Yes the creation of a supposedly tailor made track for India
backfired, but we were able to witness some wonderful cricket, with the pitch
not too inclined to support one facet of the game.
It has become a major talking
point, whether India’s strategy of preparing pitches to suit their team is
moral or not. Though I see no problem in having pitches suited to the home
team’s strength, it is the Indian team and media’s attitude with which I am
quite perplexed. The word which has been floating around has been about Australia
and England preparing green tops to suit their fast bowlers, so why should
India not prepare tracks to suit their spinners. The pitches during India’s
tours to England and Australia where nowhere close to green tops. The only
reason we lost is simple. We were outplayed in all the three departments! How
else can one explain that when Australia and England used to pile up big
scores, India could barely cross 250 in almost all of their innings? It wasn’t
as though the pitch was green when India batted and became flat when they
bowled!
There lies part of the bigger
problem for India. With the retirement of stalwarts Dravid and Laxman, and
Sachin’s colossal career coming to an end it is necessary they identify and
back a group of batsmen who have the skills to play in all sorts of conditions.
We need to give priority to performers in first class cricket -as of now we
have lot of cricketers who are coming in through performances in the limited
overs cricket. They can thrill but unfortunately it’s all frill! During the
period between 2002 and 2007 when India did reasonably well overseas a lot
credit was given to the remarkable performances of batsmen. But the most
crucial element was the performance of Kumble during that period. He was the
leading wicket taker overseas in the world during that period. Remarkable for a
man who was considered only good for home conditions. How MS Dhoni must be
wishing he had one such bowler who could perform such a similar role for him.
It is disappointing to see the
team and BCCI not admitting that they performed extremely poorly during their
last two tours. Results don’t matter but it is what you learn from the
experiences is what Dhoni has been emphasizing on. But if you don’t acknowledge
your mistakes, it is pretty hard to improve from there on. Only a couple of
test wins more and Dhoni will become the most successful Indian captain ever in
terms of wins registered. With the team in a transition period, and results not
going his way, he is going through the most difficult phase of his career. How
he performs from here, will define his legacy.
