India frittered away the advantage of winning the toss by a tepid batting display on a pitch that definitely had a bit more bounce than those in the one-day series. Dravid has been quite good at calling correctly and by winning the toss, he gave his bowlers the chance to use the pitch when it’s at its best and thus put pressure on the West Indians.
But as we have seen in the one-dayers, the batting has been a mixture of carelessness-cum-too defensive an approach and it has allowed the bowlers to dictate terms.
The manner in which Sehwag began, it looked as if he was going to make up for all the missed opportunities in the one-dayers and make the West Indies pay. What was impressive was the way he was playing off the back foot for it was obvious that the Windies weren’t going to give him much on the front foot. He had raced away in spite of losing Jaffer early on and with Laxman also looking composed, it did look like a good toss to win. But just before lunch, there was disaster as both Sehwag and Laxman offered limp bats outside the off stump to lose their wickets.
Still with Dravid there at the crease along with Yuvraj who has been in splendid touch, there were no alarms in the Indian dressing room. Yuvraj fell for the second consecutive time to Dave Mohammad and that started the slide as Kaif, Dhoni and all made fleeting appearances at the crease. There was some resistance from Kumble, who has made some top contributions with the bat in recent Tests and with Sreesanth also batting sensibly, India got past 200 with only one wicket left. It will mean that India will have to really bowl well and ensure that the match is brought on an even keel again, else they could end up in trouble in the first Test of the series itself.
India have shown signs of panic by discarding the five batsmen-five bowlers policy that was adopted against the Englishmen. The omission of two stalwarts Harbhajan and Pathan has made the bowling look pretty inexperienced, and unless the new-ball bowlers bowl the right length, they might find that it can get pretty expensive against the Caribbean maulers. True, there’s a bit of bounce in this pitch but that’s exactly what can make inexperienced bowlers get carried away and bowl the wrong line-and-length. All the seam bowlers are not big movers of the ball and on these pitches deviation can be very useful. That’s why Pathan’s omission is a surprise. Still, it’s a great chance for the newcomers to show their skills and show that they are up to it.
This is the venue where Brian Lara has got 375 and 400 and if he is in the mood again, then the next few days may well be the steepest learning curve for the young inexperienced bowlers in the Indian team.
