HARARE, 20 February 2003 — India’s win over Zimbabwe was a win which gave them not only 4 valuable points but the belief that they can go on in this tournament. Zimbabwe have always been tough opponents not because they have talented players, but because they have whole-hearted triers who make it hard for any team that they play.
India went to Harare with plenty of self doubts and now return to South Africa with lots of confidence restored. They still have place to improve, especially the fielding and the back-up bowling. The revised batting order worked as Tendulkar and Sehwag gave the side a brisk start and laid the foundation for a big total. That it wasn’t smooth sailing after that tells you how shell-shocked the players especially the batsmen are. The other factor to rejoice about is that finally after a long time the Indians realized the importance of keeping their early wickets intact in the first fifteen overs when the ball moves and bounces more than later. It’s these overs where India has lost the game earlier when by the 20th over they used to be five down with not many on the board.
Ganguly dropped himself down the order and it shows that he is flexible and not stubborn, which is a good thing as it was in the interest of the side. Mongia at three also was a good move as he was the batsman who had some time in the middle in the earlier matches. Zimbabwe were handicapped by the fact that Grant Flower, who was bowling so economically, had to go off the field at a crucial time but the Indians did not help their cause by not rotating the strike as they should have. It’s an area that they need to look at, for against better teams than Zimbabwe this will come in the way of putting up a decent total. Dravid looked to be making an effort to keep it moving but when batsmen are not in the best of touch everything looks hard.
Fortunately, all the batsmen barring Yuvraj got a decent time in the middle and that will help their confidence greatly and if they can score heavily against Namibia then the last two tough games against England and Pakistan will be that much easier. India must realize that it’s their batting that will win them the cup and for that they need to put enough runs on the board, for their bowlers to feel confident.
With 255 on the board Srinath bowled a top spell to curb Zimbabwe openers and picked 2 wickets that put the team on the backfoot. Zimbabwe’s batting depends so much on the Flower brothers that if they don’t contribute majorly they struggle and that was evident here as once they failed the batting went to pieces. Ganguly used his bowlers including himself wisely and though he didn’t set the stands on fire he did enough to be the all-rounder of the game. Grant Flower came close too but he was on the losing side.
It was a morale boosting win and India have lots of positives to take from it especially the way in which they plotted and planned Andy Flower’s dismissal bowled behind his legs. That was great stuff and Harbhajan justified his inclusion with that all important wicket.
India have an easy game now against Namibia but looking at the spirited performance that Namibia put up against England there is no room for complacency. Let’s also keep our fingers crossed that the spell of bad weather blowing across South Africa does not affect this match that’s the last thing this Indian team wants.
