THE BEST VERSUS THE FAVOURITES

Against the run of play, as Ravi Shastri likes to call it, India has stormed into the Semi Finals of the World Cup 2015. Apart from the tricky 15 overs spell from Bangladeshi bowlers, India looked in ultimate control and the result of the Quarter-Final was a pre-known eventuality. Indian bowlers have picked 70 wickets in 7 matches. Almost all of its batsmen are looking in a good nick. So India goes into the Semi Final with lot of confidence and good form, which wasn't the story 3 months back when it was repeatedly outclassed by a dominant Australian side. Glen Maxwell has already reminded India of those horrendous 3 months in a press conference. So how should India approach the most important match of its tournament?

To begin with, India needs to win the toss more than Australia does. Though India has chased targets four times in this tournament, three of them were against associate nations, one of which was almost lost if it wasn't for Raina and Dhoni. The Indian top order has looked sharp but a head by head analysis throws in some interesting perspective. Shikhar Dhawan has quickly turned around his fortunes in this World Cup but he now faces the same bunch of bowlers who had made the early part of his Australian summer miserable. As for Rohit Sharma, his innings against Bangladesh was as important as it gets but it is far from suggesting that the man has arrived. It is very difficult to not like the guy but the one word that often gets associated with greatness is consistency. This is his best chance to shun all the criticism because a good batting display from him would certainly take India a long way.

Throughout the Australian test series, only three Indian batsmen came out shining. Two of them are playing this World Cup. This World Cup has thrown two double hundreds, some 440 odd sixes and many 300 plus scores. However, if you want to come on top of this Australian bowling, only big bats will not suffice. Technique is what you need against this fiery Aussie pace attack as each one of them will test every ounce of your technique. Technique-wise, only two batsmen look capable of handling the Australian bowling attack. It is imperative for Virat Kohli and Ajinkya Rahane to be at the top of their game. Because if India has to score anywhere near 300 (my bet is India needs at least 275), both of them have to score a bulk of those runs. Suresh Raina has been wonderful so far in this World Cup but facing the 150 kms plus Mitchell-duo will be a formidable task for him.

That brings me to India’s bowling. It has been the most successful bowling attack in this World Cup. It has bowled out each of its opposition. Surprisingly, short pitch bowling has claimed some 30 odd wickets. However, will the short length be successful against the Australian batting? The answer was perhaps given by Wahab Riaz yesterday. He did make some of the Australian batsmen uncomfortable and India can draw some comfort from that fact. (Indian bowlers can rest assured of no butter fingers in the deep when they are bowling.) Indian pacers must also keep it under control though. Over doing anything is always harmful and the pressure of a semi final may compel the young Indian fast bowlers to overdo the short pitch stuff. India’s real key to success is its spinners. South African spinners (even if that’s a rare species) took 7 wickets on a Sydney pitch. India must not forget this stat. Australia possess Glen Maxwell in the middle order who can take any spinner apart but the line, length and speed with which Ashwin is bowling in this World Cup, it would be very difficult for even someone like Maxwell to hit him consistently. Jadeja is seemingly getting his length right and for an entirely right handed middle order of Australia, he can be very tricky to handle. The Indian fielding will match Australia’s for sure and bowlers will get extra help from a brilliant fielding unit.

All said and done, the best team of the tournament so far meets the favourites and that itself assures a high octane Semi Final. Mahendra Singh Dhoni has never lost a Semi Final of an ICC Tournament. He has not been at his best so far in this tournament, but neither was he in the 2011 World Cup till the final. He chose the final of that World Cup to show his class. Perhaps he is waiting for 26^th of March 2015 for another of his specials. India has been playing wonderful cricket in this tournament without its captain performing. What a statement it would be if the captain chooses the toughest match to come to party.

TALE OF TWO CAPTAINS

The win against Ireland has ensured that India will top Pool B. But that’s not the only achievement this result brings. The win has again brought the age old debate to the fore. Who is the best Indian Captain ever? After being humiliated by Australia in its second match of the ICC Cricket World Cup 2003, India registered 8 consecutive wins to reach the final, where it was beaten comprehensively by Australia again. ICC World Cup 2003 to date remains India’s most romantic cricketing story. M.S. Dhoni now holds the record for the most number of consecutive wins in World Cups for India after India made a meal of the Irish team in the last match. So is it the man who made us believe or is the man who fulfilled our greatest dream?

Comparisons are inevitable in Indian cricket. But the circumstances in which these two cricketers took over captaincy do not give us a fair ground to compare. These very circumstances decided and defined the actions of the two. For Saurav Ganguly, the main task was to instill faith and confidence in the team. He needed to be aggressive, expressive. He had to bring a sense of belonging. He had to carry the excess baggage of poor performances of previous teams and the suspicious eyes of Indian cricket fans. It always played its cricket in a ‘good boy’ manner. Even India’s premier fast bowler Srinath would apologise to a Ponting when his fast bouncer hit his head. No previous Indian captain had dared to speak a few words here and there. So by making Steve Waugh wait for the toss seemed arrogant at that time but gave the team some confidence in a strange way. It was all about making a statement. That punch in the air through a mistimed jump at Brisbane made a statement or the famous shirt wave from Lord’s balcony made a statement. We will not back down. This uncanny confidence rubbed on to the team and this confidence helped India achieve those fantastic results in England, Australia, Pakistan and of course in World Cup 2003.

Dhoni’s choice as captain was a measured risk. Indian cricket had just recovered from a shocker stint of Greg Chappell as coach. What the Indian team required was a bit of calm. That was Dhoni’s biggest strength. Dhoni had to captain a side which had six senior cricketers; some of whom were legends of the game.  Dhoni had the task to captain a team which had three former captains. That is never easy. Dhoni needed to be patient, calm but assertive. These exact qualities made him the captain he is. He had the base of a good team ready. He had the formidable middle order, a bunch of quick bowlers, a great spinner and great young talent. His job was to channelize his resources. It is one thing to have the resources and altogether a different thing to use them effectively. Many times, his captaincy looked rigid, stagnant but almost every time, it yielded results. His ability to extract the best out of a player with minimal words is a great quality to have.

Statistics are often used as a base to compare. Dhoni has the most no. of wins in test matches as Indian captain. He is the only captain in the world who has ICC treble. He led India to the no. one rank in test cricket & to being the best one day team in the world. He is the most successful Indian captain. Statistically, Ganguly does not even come close to Mahendra Singh Dhoni. But Ganguly’s legacy is not in statistics but in the attitude and unorthodox, sometimes controversial decisions he made; be it pushing Rahul Dravid to no. 6 position or asking him to keep wickets, risking a quality player like Sehwag to open the innings, giving unconditional support to youngsters like Yuvraaj, Harbhajan, Kaif & Zaheer Khan.

So how does one compare their performance as captain, if it is that much necessary? The answer has perhaps emerged during the last three-four years. Without the batting legends and a smart bowling leader, India’s test performance reached a new low every time it set foot on a foreign shore. The 4-0 test series losses in England, Australia reminded everybody of India of the 90s. The recent drubbing in England and Australia underlined one huge difference between the captaincy of Saurav Ganguly and M.S.Dhoni.  Where Saurav Ganguly excelled at Test captaincy due to his positive and aggressive attitude, M.S.Dhoni often lacked intent in crucial moments in many away test matches. His ultra defensive techniques allowed matches to drift away. On many occasions, he was found waiting for things to happen instead of making them happen. But the moment he puts on colored clothing, he is transformed into a proactive and attacking captain. It seems he prefers the energy of the shorter format. Also the fact that he is a far better and more successful ODI batsman than a test batsman must help. Overall, there is no doubt in my mind that he is India’s greatest ODI captain of all time. But the test crown belongs to India’s first leader. So have I answered the million dollar question? Perhaps not. May be there is no answer to this question. What I do know for sure is that I am blessed to have watched Indian cricket under both these fantastic leaders.

THE CURIOUS CASE OF WEST INDIES

The idea behind starting this blog was to analyse India’s performances in the ICC World Cup 2015. With a pool that has Pakistan and West Indies, I knew it would be hard to not talk about them. Against Pakistan, India gave me a chance to talk about its spectacular performance. Pakistan too was not at its erratic best in that match. West Indies over the years have given us so much to talk about. The yester years were all about the menacing fast bowling and of Sir Viv Richards. Presently, it’s all about unpredictability and a strange team combination. From the great tales of fast bowling to Samuel’s farcical run out in the last match, West Indies cricket never fails to amuse you.

So, let’s do the headcount. West Indies gives us this giant who regardless of his form intimidates you. Often, he consumes 10 to 15 deliveries to get going and when he gets going, even the big Australian grounds start looking like your backyards. But the thing with him now-a-days is you never know which Gayle would turn up; the one who shreds bowling attacks to bits or the one who is apprehensive about short pitched balls and opts for a hurriedly chosen pull shot to end his misery.  Furthermore, if an official from the West Indies Cricket Board celebrates your failure publicly on twitter, one can guess how difficult life currently is for the man.

When one of your openers is struggling for runs, the other one has to step up. That holds true for every team, except the West Indies. Only West Indies would dare to open with a guy who averages 18. Dwayne Smith might be a handy opener in IPL but West Indies just does not seem to be able to tell between IPL & International Cricket. Even stranger is the reason why it does not select Sunil Narine. He is a good T20 bowler, they say. The fallacy in these two selections is obvious unless of course you have followed West Indies Cricket for a while. The One-Down position is a revered position in cricket. Greats like Rahul Dravid, Rickey Ponting, and Jack Kallis have held this position. West Indies goes with Marlon Samuels. He is inconsistency personified and to put him at number three is being a bit too optimistic. When a batsman who averages 28 in the domestic cricket is playing for you in the middle order in a World Cup held in Australia, ahead of Kieron Pollard and Dwayne Bravo, you cannot help but ask yourself - has the quality of this great cricketing nation deteriorated so much or has politics completely taken over?

It’s the West Indies after all and you never know what it would come up with. So after a mediocre batting performance, only West Indies could have made this match close. For the better part of the Indian innings, West Indies bowlers had a hold on the in-form Indian batting. Jarome Taylor, Jason Holder and Kemar Roach bowled with pace and purpose. It was Ashwin’s sensible and calm presence which made Dhoni’s task much easy. West Indies’ only chance to win this match was to pick 10 Indian wickets. Hence the decision to give Marlon Samuels those last few overs was baffling to say the least. Every frontline West Indian bowler had overs up his sleeve when the match finished. Then again, it’s the West Indies and such a move should not come as a surprise.

Anyway now, enough about West Indies! India gained 2 more precious points and is almost certain to top Pool B, but some uncomfortable questions still haunt it. When is Rohit Sharma going to come out of his talent cocoon and start delivering consistently? Will Ravindra Jadeja and Suresh Raina be able to handle serious fast bowling come the business end of the tournament? At the present moment when West Indies seemed to be riddled with some grave problems, India cannot shy away from the fact that it has got one or two of its own.

SLOW DEATH ON THE FASTEST PITCH

Many a times, Media and Experts romanticize a particular match. It could be a statistic or a past incident or a piece of history of the venue or the teams. As Vikram Sathaye says, “half the credit of the excitement of Sachin’s Sharjah innings should go to Tony Craig and his ‘straight down the ground all the way for six’ remark”. With Perth, it’s always the bounce.  Everybody likes to talk about the bounce and the difficulty batsmen face in handling it. It makes the match that much more exciting. Well! Not this one. After a few short balls from Bhuvneshwar Kumar & Mohit Sharma and a brief fiery spell from Umesh Yadav, M.S. Dhoni decided to end the ‘Perth excitement’ and introduced R. Ashwin in the 11^th over itself.

There is a wonderful short story by Alfred Hitchcock in which a nurse is hired to take care of a lone ailing old lady with a healthy will. The nurse tries a ‘slow poison death’ on the old lady by mixing a small portion of a poison in her daily milk. Every time Dhoni’s spinners choke the opposition batting, I cannot help but think of this analogy. That’s how M.S.Dhoni likes it, doesn’t he? While Ashwin and Jadeja slowly strangled UAE’s batting, one fact emerged very strongly, which is encouraging and possibly the most crucial in India’s title defense.

India’s pace bowling looked sharp against South Africa but history of Indian fast bowling tells us that it has been very consistent in one aspect, its inconsistency. India’s current fast bowling is definitely prone to inconsistency.  It is natural and to some extent acceptable if this young pace bowling attack cracks under the pressure of a knock-out game. It needs a dependable back up. Ashwin and Jadeja are experienced enough to take that responsibility.

Quality spin attack is the only factor which distinguishes India from rest of the Quarter-Finalists. It certainly gives India some comfort in a potential banana skin match against Ireland. In Australia, spin has to be the ventilator in case the heart fails. UAE is an associate nation. Sachin’s Desert Storm in 1998 is the most scintillating moment in India’s association with UAE till date. It was unlikely that this match was going to match up to it. But Ashwin and Jadeja’s performance in the match, on the back of last two matches will give India confidence that it can depend on them. Dhoni will be beyond doubt depending on his spinners with all his silly points, short legs and leg slips. That’s how he likes it. That’s how he prefers it. Strangle them until they choke. Slow death so that you enjoy every bit of it. Just like the master, Alfred Hitchcock.