Of trial and errors

Hey, thanks a lot you guys -- following my last column, dozens of readers from New York wrote in telling me that I was mistaken in assuming it was difficult to follow cricket, live, from here.

And they're right -- it's easy as 1 2 3. One suggestion made was to opt for the TV Asia cable service -- thanks for the suggestion, but I gave that the go by because it is deferred live, with telecast starting only at 4 pm (now why is that, I wonder?)

The other option the readers suggested turns out to be the simplest, and best -- to wit, Wisden's streaming video. Back home in India, we generally tend to resist the temptation to go in for broadband, thanks to sluggish line speeds that defeat the purpose. Here, having watched the first two sessions of the second Test live, I'm impressed. Ideally, you want to see things large as life and twice as natural, but if you discount that, this feed is as good as it gets.

On an unrelated note -- and I won't bring this up again -- the interest, and support, for the game in this country continues to amaze (and, at times, amuse). Like, for instance, the other day I get a call from Prashanth Narella, wanting to know if I was planning a trip California way. On being told no, he figures out a way of getting himself and a bunch of his friends into a room with a phone that has the conference feature, and we end up spending a good 45 minutes arguing cricket.

Amazing (the interest), amusing (talk of creative problem-solving), and loads of fun.

To cut to the chase -- day one of the second Test provided food for thought, even before the first ball was bowled.

Firstly, take the dropping of Anil Kumble. Forget the emotionalism -- Anil has won us more games, over the last decade or so, than any other bowler or batsman. He is senior. He is captain designate, if and when there is a change of guard.

And yet and yet. His lifetime record outside of India is 108 wickets in 33 Tests at 40.50 (thanks, Anand Nair, for the research). That over his last 10 away Tests (I was looking at the period 1998-2002), his figures are 32 wickets at an average of 45.09 and a strike rate of a wicket every 99.91 deliveries. (Incidentally, away from home Tendulkar takes wickets at 41.08 and Ganguly at 40.33 average and 69.11 strike rate).

When you are playing in India -- or in fact anywhere in the world where the pitch could break up, or provide inordinate (better still, uneven) bounce, Kumble's is perhaps the first name you want to pencil in. But when we are playing on seaming tracks? I am not so sure -- the above figures certainly don't suggest that.

So, the dropping of Kumble for this Test is not as debatable as it appears. In a sense, it is even very welcome -- assuming, that is, that the team is finally beginning to realize that 'horses for courses' is in fact a very sound policy.

I was once chatting with the late Ramakant Desai -- when he was chairman of selectors -- about how teams are picked. And 'Tiny' Desai in all seriousness said, 'See, when we sit down, we can pencil in 9 or 10 names straightaway. It is the other four or five that we ponder over.'

This is one part of our problem -- we tend to approach cricket selection as if it were the bureaucracy, picking names not on the basis of conditions and opposition involved, but on the basis of 'seniority'.

The decision to rest Kumble for the Test now underway is perhaps the first instance of its kind in recent memory, where a fully fit senior player is being benched on the basis of suitability, or lack thereof, for the game in question.

Or is it? Without going into how I know (I don't want to get a certain very senior board official in trouble), I'll put all I have behind this statement -- ever since the selectors indicated, late last year, that Kumble is the man in waiting for the captaincy, the incumbent has in various ways been attempting to get the leg-spinner axed.

'We should not take him on a long, tough tour of the West Indies; he has just come out of a prolonged injury break, what if he aggravates that injury, we need him for the World Cup which is more important' is, typically, the argument that has been used.

Which is why I hope that the decision was taken by the right people for the right reasons, and that we are not seeing backroom politics in action again.

Once the team starts thinking of match situations and opposition and picking teams and strategies accordingly, it would have taken a huge step towards shedding an unwanted legacy of its past. It will put a premium on performance rather than hype or seniority; it will mean that anyone - any one -- who makes the final cut does so on merit and fitness for the particular game, and not on the basis of past achievement. And if all this becomes a trend, then it needs must reflect in results.

In passing, two thoughts arising from the action in the second Test thus far (as I write this, India is 240/4 at the end of 65 overs). Sachin Tendulkar is batting on his 29th Test century -- and very lucky to get there, what's more. That caught behind appeal was not on, but I thought he was a plumb-in-front candidate for the umpire's finger early on, but the finger stayed down and Tendulkar stayed in. The only reason for the umpire's decision in favor of the batsman, that I could see, was that the ball was bowled from wide of the crease, and that kind of angle tends to make the more cautious umpires a touch leery.

What was surprising about the early part of his innings was his indecisive footwork -- it is very rare to see Sachin unsure of whether to go on the front foot or back. Makes you wonder if it has to do with the fact that of late, the batsman has been trying to re-engineer his batting style or whether a pitch that before play began seemed to be a true seamer's track has been showing signs of staying a touch low at times. Which in turn makes you wonder whether Carl Hooper will have cause to regret his decision to insert the opposition after winning the toss.

Which brings up the second thought - what was Hooper thinking about anyways? It was not like there was anything alarming in the shape of the wicket (as far as I could see on the Wisden feed, that is -- which is clear, but in terms of size is not quite the same as being able to see a deck on TV, or in person) to justify insertion, and India seems to be rubbing the point home by making runs without losing too many wickets.

Insertion puts the onus on the bowlers -- so what were they thinking of through the day? The first hour-and-a-half saw no bouncers -- which in itself raises eyebrows, since you would have thought they would want to test both Das and Bangar on the short stuff.

And then Sourav Ganguly, notoriously suspect against the short lifting delivery, comes in to bat -- and doesn't have to face a single short lifter. Weird, that -- I thought it was only the Indian think tank that had a penchant for missing the obvious.

And finally, this -- on the one hand we talk of the need for regular openers. And on the other, we keep experimenting with bits and pieces players -- like, never mind if Dasgupta can't keep, he can open; never mind if Bangar is not a specialist in the real sense of the word (sure, he opens for his state - but by that yardstick, Devang Gandhi, Sujit Somasundar, Vikram Rathore and a few dozen others do, but you wouldn't want them to open for India would you?).

Ask yourself why, and the answer is -- lack of confidence. The Indians lack confidence in their batting lineup, therefore they are constantly looking for ways to bolster it. They lack confidence in their bowlers' ability to win games, and so are constantly looking for ways to add extra strings to their bowling bow.

And that brings us right back to where we started this -- would any of this happen if players were chosen only on merit?

That question, in turn, brings up a certain Sourav Ganguly. I wouldn't want to see India go into a one-day game without him -- but by the same token, I wouldn't want to see India go into a Test on foreign soil with him either.

Do the facts really need mentioning? Ganguly, lifetime: 27 Tests away, 40.60 average, 7 fifties, four hundreds. Ganguly since January 1999, 14 Tests away, 35.35 average, 5 fifties and 1 hundred. Ganguly since January 2000, 10 Tests, 25.67 average, 2 fifties, no century.

Does this paint a steadily deteriorating picture?

Does this picture justify his continued place in the side?

Would Indian cricket be better served by having him focus on his one-day cricket and spend the time away from Tests concentrating on ironing out the chinks in his batting armory that have contributed to this decline?

Would Indian cricket benefit, in the interim, by using the slot thus freed to give promising youngsters of the order of Virendra Sehwag, Dinesh Mongia and Mohammad Kaif a chance to show the stuff they are made of?

And finally, if you dropped an obviously out of sync batsman and replaced him with one who merits his place, and thus really strengthened the batting, would you need the sort of stop gap measures that, in recent times, have gone by the names of Dasgupta and Bangar?

Questions, questions....

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