The Fortune could swung to either side....

The mighty come back....

    It could be much earlier, to dodge England batting order. But soon after lunch Indian, bowlers changed their plans, what they have done to England top order batsmen. Indian seamers pitched it up and seamed it away from the English batsmen till tea; got the result for it plumbing England to 124/8. But after tea, they inexplicably abandoned plans, they resorted to shorter length with wider balls, this gave Stuart Broad and Graeme Swann to free their arms and scored around seven runs per over that resulted them to a decent score of 221 runs in their first innings.
  At the same time, Indian skipper Dhoni's fielding arrangement also astonished me a bit. Rather then setting up an attacking one he resorted much on defence. This gave more advantage to the England tail-enders. Broad's some shorts went tantalizingly over the Indian fielders while others fell too short. Indian fielders' "snail-like" movement also helped them a lot. Finally a full slaughter from Praveen Kumar ended Swann's anguish at gully. There were no celebrations,only angry relief. Two sessions of good play by the Indian bowlers completely unraveled by these two players in just 12 overs.
  Earlier winning the toss, Dhoni again chosen to field first seeing the mighty conditions prevailing then and bowlers did a fantastic job to back captain's decision. ZaheerKhan's replacement in this test, Sresanth bowled enthusiastically at right places and swung away which wrecked English middle order. Also he joined in formidable alliance with Ishant and Praveen who well utilized their pace and swing. The result was that England were down to 124/8 at tea.
  England bowlers in reply started off flamboyantly as Anderson knicked Indian opener Abhinav Mukund to gully which clearly showed that he didn't learned anything from the Lord's test. At stumps on day-1 Rahul Dravid and VVS Laxman carried the Indian first innings score to 24/1 without much loss.

Read More

India - To regain their aura....

  It was always like this. Having lost in the first test match at Lords, in 2011 also the same conditions prevail. Nine years ago, in 2002, Indian team under their most unperturbed captain lost the first test match at Lords. The arrogant people met him at the street told him that they are returning to home. Then Dada replied "Why so soon? Stick on we are going to level the series...." and Dada kept his words probably more than that. India won the third and the fifth test and sealed the series. Now Lords 2011 is lost, England are more stronger than then. On the other side India will loose their bowling spearhead, Zaheer Khan.
   But now, it is already late in this series. Team India is on the verge of extinction from the eminent position of the ladder; if they loss one more. Watching the video of players practicing at Trent Bridge, one thing is clear, having a defeat of 196 runs at Lords had made them more tired than having demoralized. Especially the bowlers, who had to bowl around 210 overs by three bowlers and most interestingly Dhoni used their part time bowlers only in 19 overs and half of was bowled by himself. This led to many controversies even during the test match itself. And due to this action by the captain , the bowlers had to work over time and they dot tired. Apart from this Gambhir was injured and Sachin infected by fever. It's quite relieving for India that both are now fit and said the media that they are fit enough to play in the second test.
   Let's hope for the best from team India and keep their position on the top of the ladder itself....

 

Read More

India sunken in Anderson's fifer....

  A win in the first test match for India was improbable at the beginning of the last day of the test, yet a draw would  have been an incredible result. And for that credible result, Indian batsmen needed a special effort. The key to this was overnight not-out batsmen VVS Laxman and Rahul Dravid. I thought they will do it as both were tamed under such conditions and are capable of doing so. But both these giants fell before the leader of the English attack James Anderson in a well similar manner. For Anderson it was rising from ashes as he hadn't done anything in the first innings.

  Just look at the wickets Anderson claimed in the second innings and sealed England's victory in the 2000-th test match and the 100-th between India and England. Rahul Dravid,VVS Laxman, Sachin Tendulkar and Harbhajan Singh. I can say that England's victory in the first test match was a team effort except in the final day were the final nail had to be struck and it was perfectly executed by James Anderson....

Read More