India have gone three-up with a most convincing win over England at Goa. The pitch was one that was a mystery, seeing as there had been no international cricket there for a long time and so most experts thought a score of 220 would be good to win the game. In the event, India went well past that and almost got to 300 and that meant that England without Kevin Pietersen would have to have at least two century makers or two 100 plus partnerships to get to India’s total.
That they got to within 50 runs of India’s total is more a tribute to Collingwood’s determination and his partnership with Geraint Jones that saved England’s face and did not embarrass them.
India were indebted to Yuvraj Singh who played a wonderfully paced knock and got another century in limited overs cricket. He saw a rush of wickets as soon as he came in to bat, but in the company of the previous game’s hero Suresh Raina, he took the game away from the visitors with some powerful shots after he got to his 50 and saw that Raina was also batting well.
India still face problems on the opening front with Sehwag playing a loose shot and leaving a gap too big between bat and pad, to be bowled. When one is going through a bad patch as Viru is, then it makes sense to be a little patient and wait for the white ball to do its bit, which it does for seven or eight overs. After that the ball doesn’t move as much and by then the batsman is also well set, so he can go after the bowling. Viru’s problem is more in the approach, where he feels that he has to score faster than he does in Tests and so he tries to live up to that and is losing his wicket to bowlers he should be slamming all over the park. Dravid once again showing leadership went in with him to open the innings and made sure that there were no alarms. Pathan’s promotion was expected as soon as India dropped Gambhir and opted for Agarkar and thus went in with five bowlers in the game. While Pathan’s promotion cannot be faulted, it would have been better to have seen how Raina coped with that responsibility, for he had just played a match winning innings and so was high on confidence. Perhaps the captain will look at that option in the next games, as then if it succeeds, India will have more flexibility in their team.
Mahendra Singh Dhoni played a terrific cameo in which he played a huge shot, which just isn’t possible to find in the coaching books and that’s why it’s so tough to set a field for him. Even Ian Botham, who himself was known to play some powerful shots, found it hard to describe it though it was easiest for the scorers, as they simply put another six against the name of the dasher. It’s because Pathan and Dhoni are in such good touch that India can afford to go in with only five batsmen in the limited overs game, though its not sure if they will stick to that against other teams.
Pathan then made sure that England did not get the kind of start that it needed to get after the Indian total. Once the first few wickets were down with not too many on the board, the result was a foregone conclusion and only if the skipper played one of his blistering knocks, was England going to pose a serious challenge. The Collingwood- Jones partnership did give the Indian captain something to think about and it also gave his bowlers a good examination and they all passed quite easily, especially the much-maligned Agarkar, who probably thought that he wouldn’t get a game in the series.
Though the series is not won as yet, the 3-0 lead means that India can afford to look at other prospects and just seeing the way the visitors were zapped by the heat in Goa, one shudders to think what awaits them in Kochi.
