*Official* India in South Africa

[Prince EWS]

Steyn, step on a ball or something, please.

Philander to take five.

 

[Cevno]

lol.. the match was at stake then and the result could have gone either way. Flat track as well and not such a great bowling line up.. And here, the issue is that we were ONLY 25 behind.. Surely, it is not that difficult for a guy of Sachin's class to score 25, even with #Jack for company???/

You are saying that track was flatter ,then you must be kidding.
These were easily better batting conditions,with less pressure on the tail.

Besides what about the perth test with laxman in the last australia tour,or the sydney test with Sachin ?Or the recent newzealand series too?

Just going hell for leather does not certainly have a better success rate than giving the tail the strike and could have meant

Look, the ones who are saying this about him, we accept that it is a minor thing and it is a minor criticism, at least from me. But people who keep defending him, you are completely missing the point. What Tendulkar did was the equivalent of someone lying down for the 10 count in boxing even though he was not COMPLETELY knocked out...

No it wasn't.

India has been following this strategy not only with Tendulkar ,but with Dravid too for quite a while now even before Gary Kirsten became the coach and since then Gary Kirsten has supported this strategy too.
I was at first critical of this strategy but it has been succesful many times(atleast 5) now and has lead to improvement in the batting of the tailenders too.

It did not come of in this instance and looks bad but even if they have had attacked alone in every instance i am pretty sure now,the success rate would have been equal or probably less.

It is not as if they would not have discussed it before the start of play with team management. The tailenders would have even known what they were required to do and so would have the team management.

 

[silentstriker]

So my impressions:

Batting: Meh. I'm not disappointed in this result. Steyn and Morkel are both world class bowlers, and Steyn might be in contention for an all time spot pretty soon. If you accept that he and they are of that class, then you can't be surprised when they blitz through your team once in a while. It goes part and parcel with facing someone of that quality. You definitely can't be surprised if you are playing them at home. It's even more likely when you show up to a first day of a Test match after spending 15 months in the subcontinent and with no tour matches. And it's pretty much guaranteed if you combine all that with the fact that the bowlers are bowling at home and the pitch is fantastic. If an all time bowler has all that going for him and DOESN'T take a bunch of wickets with any regularity, you'd have to question his status. With that said, LOL@Raina. Please can we stop thinking the IPL has any relevance to Test cricket already? Pretty please. He's worse than Yuvraj and Yuvraj is a terrible Test batsman. Pretty happy with the batting performance in the second innings when the pitch flattened out. There was a good opening partnership, SRT scored his 50th and Raina was a muppet. So all was right with the world.

Bowling: LOL@Everyone. Please can we stop thinking the IPL has any relevance to Test cricket already? Pretty please. When you bowl slower than your wicketkeeper captain, it might be a slight clue that you do not belong on the international stage. I am not too disappointed with the bowling performance because they performed about par for a horrible non-Test quality club level pop gun attack. When your spinner is the one taking wickets in the first innings in South Africa, you've got problems and it's more than your bowlers being slightly wayward or your bowlers just being out of form. It's that they can't really bowl.

In the end, they'll lose the series 2-0 probably, and in India, they would have won it by that margin. No biggie. I'm content with simply enjoying fantastic bowling from Steyn and Co. It's great watching, even, and perhaps especially, if the team you support is on the receiving end. Ideally, you'd be supporting the team with those bowlers dishing it out, but as an Indian fan, I gave up that expectation when I was about six.

 

[Cevno]

And again, you keep missing the point. Ishant is a better bat than Unadkat for sure, but even beyond that, that game we were getting close to winning with every single run we got. NOT the case here.. And it is obvious the conditions and the bowling attacks were different too. Not really too difficult to see why one is not the same as the other.

So if you are close to winning you give Ojha the strike and risk losing the game and here you do not give Unadkat the strike to just avoid a innings defeat and turn it to a 10 wicket win ?


So are you saying that if there were 10 overs left in the day you would have supported giving Sreesanth the strike ,but not in this instance?

Clutching at straws or what?

 

[Cevno]

It is NEVER gonna succeed in this situation, which is my point. It works when runs mean something and if those runs are gonna put pressure on the opposition. In this instance, and with this guy's batting ability, it was always gonna blow on our faces. It is all very well to have faith in tailenders but their batting should be good enough to deserve that faith in the first place. Yesterday night, for instance, Sachin refused a single early in the over off Steyn to protect Sreesanth. Are you trying to tell me that Sree improved overnight as a batsman or that Unadkat is a better bat in these condtions than Sreesanth?????

Are you trying to tell me it would have been a Sachin decision alone and not of the team management?

 

[Cevno]

Do you even understand what you are saying? This is exactly the sort of "we are not yet knocked out, but let us still lie down for the 10 count" attitude that I hate, really..

That same argument has been made previously for trying to hit out and hauling in the deep.

Remember that same argument being made when India lost to England at Mumbai in the last to last series .
The Indian batsmen tried to smash their way out of trouble and protect the tail but failed and were criticised for just ":giving up"

 

[vcs]

Ideally, you'd be supporting the team with those bowlers dishing it out, but as an Indian fan, I gave up that expectation when I was about six.

So true.

 

[Prince EWS]

I'm going to put it out there that I think Harbhajan looked as good with the ball as he has for years. He was getting really good shape and flighting the ball well early on. He sort of threw in the towel a bit towards the latter part of the innings, but I think it's a very small positive India can take from their bowling effort.

 

[weldone]

I have always maintained that if Raina gives his best shot in international scene he can be the batsman that Saurav Ganguly once was - in both versions of the game. I mean Ganguly didn't have the best technique against fast bowling on greentops too, but his performances in such conditions were OK because of the application he showed. At present, Raina is not showing 1% of that application. With technique or without (which is the case here), he is playing longer version of cricket with an utter stupid fashion...as stupid as Afridi (in a different way), probably. Pujara should be miles ahead of him while the team for 2nd test is being discussed. That's the only portion where Indian batting can (and needs to) improve.

Bowling, even with Zaheer back in the next one, looks piss poor though. And I am happy that Dhoni at least accepts that now.

 

[vcs]

This is the kind of post Teja usually makes but here goes...

Indian bowlers in 2010 -

Zaheer Khan - 41 wickets @22.92
Harbhajan Singh - 37 wickets @45.13
Sreesanth - 12 wickets @57.16 (AKA ****e)
Ishant Sharma - 37 wickets @37.48
Ojha - 33 wickets @43.60

Ugly.

 

[Anil]

So when we lose this series, will the saffies take over the top spot in tests?

 

[Manee]

This is the kind of post Teja usually makes but here goes...

Indian bowlers in 2010 -

Zaheer Khan - 41 wickets @22.92
Harbhajan Singh - 37 wickets @45.13
Sreesanth - 12 wickets @57.16 (AKA ****e)
Ishant Sharma - 37 wickets @37.48
Ojha - 33 wickets @43.60

Ugly.

Can people look at Sreesanth's record, look at it again and then one more time and tell me why he should be near the Test squad?

 

[Blaze 18]

Steyn, step on a ball or something, please.

Hopefully on Raina's, that way they would both be out

 

[Cevno]

Hopefully on Raina's, that way they would both be out

 

[Cevno]

Can people look at Sreesanth's record, look at it again and then one more time and tell me why he should be near the Test squad?

True.

He has a poor first class record even, so it is not really surprising that he struggles at test level.

 

[Shri]

Steyn, step on a ball or something, please.

McGrath - Ashes 2005 style or Anderson style?

Wouldn't mind him going Afridi style over Raina and Unadkat either tbf.

 

[Cevno]

This is for Overseas matches ,but recently it has been a case at home too-

India's first test Headache's


South Africa v India, 1st Test: First-Test blues for India | Cricket Features | South Africa v India | ESPN Cricinfo


I think lack of preparation time thanks to ##### BCCI is a major issue behind this.
Though perhaps does not explain all of it.

 

[joels344]

BTW, think it is one of Dhoni's best ever test knocks as well.. But then again, he has had very few in tests as opposed to ODIs, so it is not exactly THAT difficult to better his own best...

Dhoni is such a deadly batsman. I love his style and aggression.

 

[Blaze 18]

Dhoni is such a deadly batsman. I love his style and aggression.

I must confess that I didn't think he had it in him to play well in South Africa. Kudos to him for proving me wrong; same goes for Gautham Gambhir.

 

[Manee]

True.

He has a poor first class record even, so it is not really surprising that he struggles at test level.

Indeed, a poor FC record in the Plate League! I've been banging on about this for ages, but this first Test debacle may just be the time people are taking notice that he is often a liability. This obviously sets up a match winning performance in the second Test, but even that will not account for his massive inconsistency.