Sehwag is not past it. Your
correspondent would like to rescind his earlier remarks. He does not want to
witness anything special from Sehwag from the rest of the series and does now
believe that it’s likely he can still produce.
Virat Kohli is not the
only young batsman worth watching in the Indian side. Cheteshwar Pujara’s unbeaten double century was a masterly
demonstration of subcontinental batting. In counterpoint to Sehwag’s flair,
Pujara played with patience and skill, scoring only 21 fours, but leaving with
excellent judgement, defending solidly, turning the strike and using the depth
of his crease to punish square of the wicket.
One and a half spinners is
not enough in India. Graeme Swann bowled beautifully,
and it was a pleasure watching him graft away for his wickets. But wouldn’t it
have been nice to see Monty twirling at the other end? It’s true, they don’t
have a great record in tandem, but the seamers were innocuous and although
Bresnan and Broad batted better than most of the top order, that isn’t the main
reason for their selection and it was wickets we needed first.
Ashwin and Ojha’s wickets
against New Zealand weren’t a fluke. They’ve been
good, haven’t they? And it’s been great to see Dhoni backing his bowlers with
aggressive fields. With wickets tumbling, and a massive first innings score, he
had no reason to defend, but the English batsmen were in a pressure cooker from
the moment they stepped onto the field. Also, it wasn’t Ashwin’s ‘mystery’ that
produced his wickets – it was high class off-spin bowling.
Cook is just wonderful. Ok, we knew this already from not only his career record and the
oodles of runs he scored in the last Ashes, but the way he’s developed as a
one-day player and captain, upping his strike rate and adding new aggressive
shots to his repertoire. But boy did he play well today. We always hear the
same names bandied as being the good players of spin and it tends to be those
who use their feet: Ian Bell and Eoin Morgan, chiefly. Cook didn’t really use
his feet today, in terms of charging down the wicket, he just got right forward
to meet the ball in defense, and right back to cut it away. His one-day skills
have definitely added to his test repertoire and he swept with confidence,
keeping the scorecard ticking, which is essential when faced with such a
mountainous first innings total.
Nick Compton looks ok. It must be very strange making your test debut at 29, with your
opening partner and captain opposite you, still only 27 and a veteran of 83
matches. A player debuting at 29 is expected to arrive fully fledged, as
Jonathan Trott did to memorable effect in 2009. I mean nothing disparaging by
saying Compton looks ok. One fears a county player who has waited so long for
the opportunity (and is thrust into the maelstrom of a tough series in India in
a line-up of batsmen known to be weak against spin) would struggle. He may have
only made nine in the first innings, but he didn’t look at sea. So far in the
second innings he has been composed, positive in defence, pushing the singles
to the less agile fielders and only had one major aberration when he
premeditated a sweep and had to improvise a crabbed, cross-bat defensive trap
when the bowler dropped it shorter than he was expecting. The hundred
partnership is up and long may it continue.
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