New Zealand series post-mortem

I’m not quite sure how I feel at the end of the New Zealand series. On the one hand, our first series victory in New Zealand in 40 years is something to savor. On the other hand, 2-0 would have been a more accurate reflection of the difference in quality between the two teams. We could and should have beaten England 2-0, both at Mohali and at the Oval, so these are three series where the fight was truly won, but the knock-out punch not delivered. A part of me will take that – who would have thought, even a couple of years ago, that this is what we would be quibbling about? But the greedy part of me wishes for a bit more.

There are a lot of positives to take out of the series, in both the batting and the bowling departments.

The batting line-up now has a formidable look to it, and Gambhir, Dravid, Tendulkar and Laxman all came good, while Dhoni is looking better and better as a Test batsman. Gambhir, as I have already blogged, was simply phenomenal, the player of the series without a doubt. Laxman carried on the rich vein of form that he has now shown for well over a year, and it looks, finally, like he doesn’t have a selector’s axe hanging over his head. Dravid looks like he’s back and running – a 100 in the series would have been nice, but even without it, The Wall is back and looking as solid as ever.

But in some ways, the biggest joy of the series for me was watching Tendulkar bat. This is because, not only is he making runs, but he is making runs like the Tendulkar of old, perhaps even better. This is Sachin Mark III. Mark I was the Sachin of the 1990s, sheer, exuberant, unadulterated genius (albeit often genius in losing causes, or without adequate support). Mark II, from 2001-2004, still saw a lot of runs, but a more dour, defensive outlook. A lot of the strokes from the 90s were gone, and the injuries, especially the dodgy tennis elbow, were creeping in and clearly restricting his game. After a disastrous phase from 2005-07 (which coincided, as it did for so many people in this team, with the Greg Chappell years), Sachin Mark III seems to be combining the best of I and II. Glorious shots that had been put in cold storage for years, especially the pull and the flowing drives in the V, are back. But there is also a cold, calculated, almost premeditated precision about his batting now. In the 90s, it was often as if Sachin was batting by instinct. Now, it seems like he is batting at will. He decides the tempo of his innings, decides how he wants to pace it, decides which areas he will pick and focus on, decides which bowlers to target in which fashion, and then just goes about doing it. I still feel that the long-term development of India’s one-day side would be helped if he sat out a few more games to let Rohit Sharma establish himself; but in Tests, there is no question that Sachin has no parallel, even if someone like Gambhir has outweighed him in sheer number of runs this series. Over the years, it has been easy to take Sachin for granted. But now, in the twilight of his career, every innings of his is worth savoring.

The disappointment was Sehwag, and the worry is Yuvraj. Sehwag’s blip was uncharacteristic, and it is hard to put it down to bad form when he was in such sublime touch in the one-dayers. But he failed in the Tests against England as well, so that is two series in a row where he has been falling cheaply while all the while looking in fine nick. (This is unlike in 2006-07, when he looked in no sort of form at all). Hopefully, the Viru of the big hundreds will be back soon.

Yuvi is a bigger problem, because at the end of the series it is not clear whether he has what it takes to cut it in the big leagues. I would personally give him another series – I think it is important to give someone the assurance of ten games before discarding them, and the England series was the first time Yuvi was in the team for the long haul, as opposed to being a stop-gap replacement for Ganguly. So from my perspective, Yuvi still deserves another 3 or 4 games before a more definitive verdict is passed on him.

But the problem is, it is hard for me to predict whether he has the ability for Tests, simply because he has played such little four-day cricket in his career. Pretty much from the get-go, he has been a fixture in India’s one-day side, and a constant hanger-on on the sidelines in Tests. So he has toured a lot with the Indian Test side, without getting a continuous run in the side, but also therefore without playing much domestic four-day cricket. In that sense, I think there is a real detriment to getting people into the Test side through the route of one-day cricket. There is a lot of glamour and celebrity status to be had by playing one-dayers, but I really think one’s game is better honed in the humdrum existence of Ranji Trophy cricket. Someone like Gambhir, who might seem at first sight to have taken the same route, in fact piled up tons upon tons of runs in four-day domestic cricket; not to mention runs on all manner of India A tours, including in Sri Lanka, England and South Africa. Yuvi might have lots of international experience, but he just doesn’t have that kind of four-day experience. And it shows.

This is relevant as we start thinking about the generational change of guard in our batting order. Hopefully, that is not something we need to be thinking about immediately, as I hope that Dravid, Tendulkar and Laxman will carry on for another couple of years. (Laxman, after all, is only 34, which is still relatively young; and I think Sachin has a burning desire to play one more World Cup. Dravid will likely be the first of the three to retire, but he seems to be enjoying his game at the moment, so hopefully that moment is at least 12-18 months away). But it is something that is worth speculating upon.

At this point, the next generation of batsmen is to be found in two flavors. One mirrors the Yuvraj model, which are those who have become household names by being part of the one-day fold. Rohit Sharma and Suresh Raina are the two key names here, though Virat Kohli is also someone who conceivably has an international future ahead of him. Of these, I definitely think that Rohit is Test caliber; indeed, I would go so far as to say that purely in terms of natural ability, he is third only to Sachin and Sehwag amongst Indian batsmen today. But all three of them would benefit from more time in the domestic game, because the temperament to consistently play big innings isn’t yet evident. The worst thing that could happen to them is what happened to Yuvraj – for them to shuttle around the world carrying drinks for the next three years, and only getting 50-50 and T20 cricket into their systems. It would be much better if, when they are not playing shorter version cricket for India, they hone their four-day skills for their state teams.



The second mirrors the Gambhir model, which are those who have scored tons of runs in domestic cricket, and are knocking on doors through sheer dint of performance. The four people in this category are – Subramaniam Badrinath, Murali Vijay, Wasim Jaffer (yes, I still think he has an international future) and Cheteshwar Pujara. Badri has to be first in line here, and surely he would have been far more successful than Yuvraj at 6 in New Zealand conditions; Jaffer has come off one of the most sensational years in first-class cricket in the history of the Indian domestic game, scoring nearly 1500 runs; and Vijay doesn’t quite have those kind of stats, but looked so impressive in the chance he got at Nagpur (and is a brilliant close fielder, which I think is an area where we need drastic improvement). Vijay and Jaffer, of course, are openers, but either could bat at 3; or one could imagine them partnering Gambhir at the top, and having Viru drop down to 4 once Sachin retires.

Pujara is the least known of the four, but I think is a future star if he is given the proper breaks. He is technically extremely sound (and potentially an ideal replacement for Dravid as a long-term no. 3), and has made tons of runs for Saurashtra both this year and last – and hence has the sort of 4-day experience that more glamorous or well-known batsmen like Rohit or Raina don’t. It is very possible that Raina and Rohit will get a lot of media time with some good performances in the IPL, which will then ease them into the Test side because everyone will be talking about them; while someone like Pujara may not even get a game, or may struggle with the format if he does. But in terms of the long-term, I think Pujara is one of the safest bets we have. Hence, while I wish to savor Dravid, Sachin and Laxman for as long as possible, a long-term batting line-up worth nurturing (through A tours and the like) would be Jaffer / Vijay, Gambhir, Pujara, Sehwag, Badrinath, Rohit (or Yuvraj / Raina), and Dhoni. Yuvraj, in this dispensation, looks distinctly iffy. So – give him a fair run, and if he doesn’t cut it, move on. The worst possible scenario would be to keep Yuvi at 6 for the next 2 years, find that he isn’t good enough, and then have a mass exodus of the seniors as well. That will mean building a middle-order from scratch.

The bowling looks equally formidable, even though Ishant Sharma struggled in the final Test with the wind. But bowling in these conditions would have surely been a learning experience for him, and he is bound to be the better bowler for it.

The real joy though was Zaheer. Zak’s bowling now is like Sachin’s batting – he is supremely a master of his art. I won’t put him in the same league as Wasim Akram, because Akram is unparalleled (the greatest bowler I have ever seen, along with Shane Warne). But he is close, and even if the likes of Dale Steyn and Mitchell Johnson may be getting more wickets, I would suggest that purely on skill, Zak is the best fast bowler in world cricket today. His intelligence, control and versatility are simply amazing. He can bowl conventional swing, and get it to move in both directions, hitting perfect lines and lengths. He bowls a deceptively heavy short ball, and the yorker that was such a part of his armory when he first came on the scene before it dropped out is reappearing. He can bowl a bouncer off a long run-up at 125 kph and have the batsman fending because it is onto him so quickly; and he can bowl a searing out-swinger at 140 kph off a short, ten-step run. He can bowl round the wicket, playing simply on the angles if the ball is new, or getting reverse swing if the ball is old. He has become adept at controlling a cricket ball, and more importantly, unlike the Zak of old, adept at controlling his own temperament. That is the sort of maturation that we have not yet seen in Yuvraj, even though they have been playing international cricket for exactly the same amount of time.

If Zak was the joy, then Harbhajan was the surprise and revelation. I have on these pages been unstinting in my criticism of Bhajji over the past few months; but he certainly convinced me in New Zealand. The way he used the wind in Wellington to get drift was just magical. What was crucial was that he was flighting the ball, and flight is something that has been virtually absent from his bowling for the past few years. For much of the past few years, he has predominantly been a flat, defensive bowler, looking to push the ball through and hoping to pick up wickets simply by bowling lots of overs. When he tosses the ball up, he looks a completely different proposition. Of course, there were troughs as well – in Napier, when the batsmen got on top of him, he looked distinctly mediocre, suggesting again that when he doesn’t get an early wicket he retreats into a defensive shell and can be easily handled. But generally, leading the spin attack after Kumble’s retirement seems to have brought out the best in him. And let’s not forget his spunky batting at no. 8 – five crucial half-centuries at critical junctures in the past year is probably more than what Yuvraj is capable of at this point.

For me, Munaf Patel is still an iffy proposition. He did the job at Hamilton, but he remains the biggest question mark in the 11. Purely on talent, I think we need a fit Sreesanth. I would take a gamble on his temperament because his ability to swing the ball both ways at pace would nicely complement Zak’s left-arm swing, and Ishant’s ability to hit the deck, and that would really make us a versatile bowling attack with four strike bowlers. Sreesanth is someone who needs to be taken care of when he is out with injury, and we cannot afford talent like his to go waste.

While the batting and bowling look good, the real disappointment for me was the fielding. Far too many catches were dropped, both at Napier and in Wellington. Indeed, there is no point blaming the draw in the final Test on the delayed declaration, because if he had taken our catches we would have won regardless. Dravid and Laxman remain good slippers, but we don’t have a third, and Yuvraj is woeful in that position; so when those two retire, we won’t just have batting holes to fill, but catching holes. And Gambhir shows quick reflexes occasionally, but is a far from stellar short leg. With the changing of the guard in a few years, youngsters will bring in quick legs - but can they catch?

Indeed, it is because of our fielding that I would say that we cannot lay claim to the world no. 1 spot ahead of South Africa and Australia. We are close – batting, bowling, temperament, self-confidence are all there, and man for man, when lined up against the batting or bowling line-ups of either of those two sides, we can hold our own. But can we really match a fielding line-up that has Smith, Prince, Kallis, Amla, Duminy and de Villiers? Not even close, and there’s 40 runs an innings difference there, before you start counting the dropped catches.

Meanwhile, spare a thought for New Zealand. Their bowling just isn’t good enough to bowl out top teams, though their batting is halfway decent. Certainly Jesse Ryder is a real talent, not just because of his stroke-making ability, but because of his utterly tight defense. I can’t wait to see more of him in the IPL. Ross Taylor also got better and better as the series progressed, and I think Martin Guptill has talent (if somewhat suspect technique against the short ball). The real problem there is inexperience – New Zealand plays such little Test cricket against top sides. The ICC’s Future Test Program is supposedly designed to ensure against that, but like everything else the ICC does, it is a hopeless flop. So, New Zealand will only play their next Test on Boxing Day. How can a team improve its Test performances if it plays Test cricket less often than Yuvraj Singh? At this rate, with Pakistan virtually out for the count, Zimbabwe a shambles, Bangladesh still a third-rate team, and the West Indies bankrupt, one will see the development of a two-tier system in Test cricket, with terrific competition between the 4 or 5 top teams and then a huge drop in standard to the next 4 or 5. And that is bad news for the long term growth and health of the game.