Thud!
The sound of disappointment. The sound of dreams quashed. Sound of nostalgia. Of persistent traits from the past. I write this after what should have been the morning after the close of the 2nd test. But instead I write after spending what turned out to be family-outing Saturday. Instead of cricket-beverages-dinner Saturday.
Test matches last for 5 days. 30 hours of layered drama. Battles won or lost over individual sessions in trying to win the five-day war. Personal duels, sagging spirits, sapped bodies, deteriorating surface, partisan crowds and inclement weather all make for gripping cricket. At least for the viewers. Strewn amidst all this are defining moments. Or critical passages of play. The better team identifies them better. And latches on to them and make them count. These are the points around which the game hinges and fortunes change.
Sifting through the debris (from an Indian perspective) of the 2nd test, I would narrow it down to two hours.Two manic hours that changed the course of the test eventually.
Third day, first session. The second hour. The Indian bowling unit came alive in the first hour. Overnight batsman Mitchell Marsh was removed by Ishant. Bowled by a fuller ball. Brad Haddin, who is not having a great series with the bat thus far, removed by the shorter ball. Australia was definitely on the back foot. India had the momentum and had grabbed the initiative. However, what followed right afterwards defies cricketing logic. A barrage of short balls. When bowling fuller lengths earlier had kept things tight. Mitchell Johnson had feasted on a buffet well before lunch was taken. And the sweet irony? Most of the Australian wickets to fall later that day were not because of the short ball. I think Dhoni and his bowlers may well have been nostalgic about the short ball that won them a test at the Lord's. Horses for courses anybody? On an aside, reading through the articles, several Indian players may have riled up Johnson when he was batting. Unprovoked sledging as a tactic, in general, has never worked for India. Ask Zaheer Khan who bowled the first over of the 2003 World Cup final. We had lost that match after he finally completed the first set of six legal deliveries. Retaliation has done wonders: the jelly bean saga in the UK, Perth 2008. But chatter for the sake of it? Better left alone.
The second of the two: Fourth day, first session, first hour. There could have been a traffic jam of Indian batters in that hurried procession to and from the pavilion. An old-school, Indian batting collapse. A flash straight from the nineties. Granted the pitch had cracks and was doing more than it did over the previous days. Granted that we had woken up the sleeping giant (but, why?) in Mitchell Johnson. But that would just be fishing for excuses. Let's face it: the Indian batters simply didn't fight. Or they were not up for it. Kohli, Sharma and Rahane had no business playing the way they did against their respective last deliveries. And Che Pu would have negotiated that delivery five different ways on any day. But when the chips are down, when it mattered the most in the third innings of a test on the balance, the crucial one hour when we needed to hang in there and put a price on each wicket, we were busy gift wrapping the test for the Aussies. Merry Christmas!
In the end, perhaps a hundred more runs could have made the difference. But then I would pin the blame on the bowlers for the second time around. Giving up a near hundred run lead after that batting display in the first innings was simply unacceptable. It is worth remembering that no team can hide behind a weak bowling attack. Definitely not behind Sharma, Yadav and Aaron. Waiting for the declaration or the new ball isn't a good strategy. This attack, if you are generous, is that squandering son of the rich father. That leak in the boat that can sink it eventually.
Off to Melbourne goes the circus. I hope there is a better show come Boxing day. Until then, enjoy our gift the Aussies.
The sound of disappointment. The sound of dreams quashed. Sound of nostalgia. Of persistent traits from the past. I write this after what should have been the morning after the close of the 2nd test. But instead I write after spending what turned out to be family-outing Saturday. Instead of cricket-beverages-dinner Saturday.
Test matches last for 5 days. 30 hours of layered drama. Battles won or lost over individual sessions in trying to win the five-day war. Personal duels, sagging spirits, sapped bodies, deteriorating surface, partisan crowds and inclement weather all make for gripping cricket. At least for the viewers. Strewn amidst all this are defining moments. Or critical passages of play. The better team identifies them better. And latches on to them and make them count. These are the points around which the game hinges and fortunes change.
Sifting through the debris (from an Indian perspective) of the 2nd test, I would narrow it down to two hours.Two manic hours that changed the course of the test eventually.
Third day, first session. The second hour. The Indian bowling unit came alive in the first hour. Overnight batsman Mitchell Marsh was removed by Ishant. Bowled by a fuller ball. Brad Haddin, who is not having a great series with the bat thus far, removed by the shorter ball. Australia was definitely on the back foot. India had the momentum and had grabbed the initiative. However, what followed right afterwards defies cricketing logic. A barrage of short balls. When bowling fuller lengths earlier had kept things tight. Mitchell Johnson had feasted on a buffet well before lunch was taken. And the sweet irony? Most of the Australian wickets to fall later that day were not because of the short ball. I think Dhoni and his bowlers may well have been nostalgic about the short ball that won them a test at the Lord's. Horses for courses anybody? On an aside, reading through the articles, several Indian players may have riled up Johnson when he was batting. Unprovoked sledging as a tactic, in general, has never worked for India. Ask Zaheer Khan who bowled the first over of the 2003 World Cup final. We had lost that match after he finally completed the first set of six legal deliveries. Retaliation has done wonders: the jelly bean saga in the UK, Perth 2008. But chatter for the sake of it? Better left alone.
The second of the two: Fourth day, first session, first hour. There could have been a traffic jam of Indian batters in that hurried procession to and from the pavilion. An old-school, Indian batting collapse. A flash straight from the nineties. Granted the pitch had cracks and was doing more than it did over the previous days. Granted that we had woken up the sleeping giant (but, why?) in Mitchell Johnson. But that would just be fishing for excuses. Let's face it: the Indian batters simply didn't fight. Or they were not up for it. Kohli, Sharma and Rahane had no business playing the way they did against their respective last deliveries. And Che Pu would have negotiated that delivery five different ways on any day. But when the chips are down, when it mattered the most in the third innings of a test on the balance, the crucial one hour when we needed to hang in there and put a price on each wicket, we were busy gift wrapping the test for the Aussies. Merry Christmas!
In the end, perhaps a hundred more runs could have made the difference. But then I would pin the blame on the bowlers for the second time around. Giving up a near hundred run lead after that batting display in the first innings was simply unacceptable. It is worth remembering that no team can hide behind a weak bowling attack. Definitely not behind Sharma, Yadav and Aaron. Waiting for the declaration or the new ball isn't a good strategy. This attack, if you are generous, is that squandering son of the rich father. That leak in the boat that can sink it eventually.
Off to Melbourne goes the circus. I hope there is a better show come Boxing day. Until then, enjoy our gift the Aussies.
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