Tuesday, December 05, 2006

NOT A WHITEWASH

What if India lost the one day series 4-0?
There are some positives to come out of the series.

It was not a whitewash as some would like us to believe. A whitewash would have meant a 5-0 loss. But it is now only 4-0.The raingod save us from that ignominy.

No Indian batsman except Dhoni aggregated even 100 runs. But that is to be expected when the team is in the process of rebuilding and experimenting.

Sachin is still in fine touch as evident from the last match where he scored a half-century. But he was not even a shadow of his best in the other matches.


Sehwag looked burdened with the captaincy due to the injury to Dravid. The selectors realized this and gave the test match captaincy to Laxman.

Dinesh Karthick was suddenly elevated to the pantheons of Indian cricketing greats following the innings in the 20-20 match. His fielding was also top class.

Jaffer was the best equipped to cope with the bouncing and the seaming balls but he could not last long at the crease to demonstrate his talents and skills.

Irfan Pathan averaged better with the bat than with the ball. But he is still to get opportunities for we want him to be a Kapil Dev.

Harbhajan was expected to spin the Proteas out but he was hit out of the park. Of course, he still is a fine bowler in Indian conditions.

The selections of Saurav Ganguly for the test matches and the late inclusion of Laxman for the one-dayers were construed as something of signal to Chappell. But the experimentation continues.

To paraphrase the great Shelley, if winter is here, spring cannot be far behind.

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