India will definitely miss a third spinner in Sairaj Bahutule. He is a natural turner and capable of turning the ball even on flat tracks. The wicket looks pretty good for batting and I am not sure if India will be able to bowl out the kiwis twice in the match to win and go 1-0 ahead. The choice of Balaji is really surprising, to say the least. I cant think of many test matches which India has won in the recent past in their home turf due to the exploits of the faster men. Its the spinners who have won the matches for us & here too, when the wicket looks even better than the normal ones prepared for tests, India shud have gone in with 3 spinners.I hope the Indians do not regret after the test match that they didnt go for a third spinner. Also the decision to select Sehwag ahead of Bangar is puzzling. Sehwag is still very much a one day specialist and Bangar wud have been a better choice considering his ability to bowl and take crucial wickets.Captain Saurav himself conceded that he missed the services of Bangar.Hope the team management looks into these things before selecting the team for the next match.
First of all let me congrats Ganguly for getting 100 not out but frankly speaking he should be sitting in the dressing room if he was suffering from groin injury which would have definitely allowed Yuvraj to make his debut. Laxman coming ahead of Ganguly and Ganguly was feeling uncomfortable during the course of the innings are all "humbak", in my opinion it is lack of confidence that has resulted in Ganguly taking the decision( Sachin getting out and India were in a bit of spot as adimitted by Dravid also). Boycott said Ganguly was playing like Prince of Calcutta with great piece of foot work and timings but if a person is suffering from Groin Injury (before facing the first ball in the game) I doubt anybody in the world can play with such perfection so to me all these Groin Injury and Ganguly coming at No 6 are nonsense. Ganguly should stop giving all these kind of excuses if he really wants to be a Prince of Calcutta.
The writer clearly seems like a novice when he compares australia's run rate with india's. Maybe he should cast a cursory glance at facts like the the nature of the pitch and quality of players on either side of the world. And I bet he would have criticized Ganguly if he would have brought on Sehwag early and he wouldn't have taken a wicket.
It's ridiculous that we should complain about our bowling while praising the Aussies' performance against Zimbabwe!! How can you compare bowling to the Kiwis, v/s batting against Z'we?? Are we so eager to prove ourselves inferior to the firang's that we are now looking for opportunities to do so??
will faisal shariff please stop his dreary biased carping against saurav ganguly. it beats me guys: are we indians such deadbeats that we can't stand a captain who is successful or what? so what if ganguly didn't bring in tendulkar to bowl... he's saddled with the likes of balaji isn't he?
Indian bowlers hasn't bowled very well. they have to bowled out all the kiwis before tea. inspite of that they may not win the match they may have to satisfy with a drawn.
This article is too much pessimistic. Author seems to be fond of wicket falling at every ball and assuming that the other team is a bunch of school boys playing cricket. Critisism is good not the unnecessary one!
Javagal Srinath can predict better than any Indian astrologer. Before the match Srinath said that the Motera pitch would not help the bowlers at all. Srinath was exactly right. India lost only 5 wickets in the 1st innings which was the most boring batting display ever.(compared to Hayden-Gilchrist's whimsical run riot party at Perth). Sadly though the Aussies with a run rate of over 5 make the Indian batsmen with a run rate of just 3 look appalingly amateurish. The pitch could be the culprit and not the batsmen because Laxman and Ganguly are capable of taking the bowlers by the horns. With only 2 days left and NZ still batting, a dreary draw seems the most likely outcome. Its a shame the other Indian bowlers (or even Zaheer himself) failed to capitalize on Zaheer's initial brilliant fiery spell. Indian revenge is looking to end up in a meek whimper. As expected NZ are no pushovers like India were when they visited NZ last year.
