West Indies dominates finally

By Vijay Lokapally

HARARE, JULY 7. It was domination all right. But not Indian, as was widely expected. The Caribbean steel band in action was an indication of which way the wind blew most of the way in the final of the triangular series here on Saturday.

The West Indians were winners in every aspect of the game as they beat the Indians by 16 runs at the Harare Sports Club.

The performance by the Indians left their supporters disappointed but they had their moments of excitement on the field. ``It's a shame we lost the final after playing good cricket in the earlier matches,'' said Sourav Ganguly. But then India had done nothing to justify its potential until the pair of Reetinder Singh Sodhi and Sameer Dighe raised visions of a sensational victory.

Faced with an imposing target of 291, the Indians, guilty of complacency this day. The poor 15 overs by the bowlers had an impact later on the batsmen too as India lost four wickets in its first 15 overs. That put the team on the defensive.

The Indian team once again returns empty-handed from an overseas tour. The Test series drawn and triangular series lost puts Ganguly and his men, with no exception, in no different state than the many in the last few years.

The defeat today also confirmed the fact that the Indians play different brand of cricket in the sub-continent and outside it.

India revelled in the latter-order after the bowling lacked the character of earlier matches. The West Indies, hardly backing itself in the preceding matches, was known as an unpredictable combination worthy of some sensational stuff but this lop-sided contest was not the picture visualised even by Carl Hooper on the eve of the final.

Sachin Tendulkar, recovering from a stomach upset, lasted a mere four balls and was out to a very irresponsibly- executed pull shot. The `man of the series' honour was poor consolation for him.

Sourav Ganguly belted a few desperate strokes and made his way back when trapped plumb. V. V. S. Laxman once again displayed shoddy shot selection and presented a comfortable catch to square leg when pulling while Virender Sehwag was completely out of place to tackle this kind of challenge. His soft dismissal was not a surprise at all.

All this while Rahul Dravid played in keeping with his reputation and calibre on pitches overseas but he was only delaying the inevitable.

Corey Collymore, recovering from an injury, had dealt three crucial blows and was rightly adjudged the `man of the match.'

Sodhi hit a fifty to finish with a decent match for himself and Dighe produced his career-best effort but these runs, gallant though, failed to alter the course of the match as India was shut out by the West Indies.

To Dighe's credit, he batted like a champion to take the fight to the last over of the match. He gave up only when the task was 19 off the last three balls. It was a gutsy innings which should do a world of good to Dighe's career. It also enabled India save some face.

The West Indians had obviously done the ground work for this day and had marked the weak links in the opposition well. Asked to bat in overcast conditions, the West Indians made use of the good batting track and adopted refreshingly positive tactics to leave the opponents in a mess.

Off to an explosive start, 96 runs in 15 overs, the West Indians may have shocked many in the stands who had come to recognise India as a supremely superior side. It was not so.

The Indians disintegrated in quick time against the innovative performance by Gayle and Ganga. The pair exposed the shortcomings in the Indian bowling most glaringly.

This morning, Hemang Badani pulled a groin muscle and his place was taken by Sodhi, who showed the right attitude but India allowed the game to drift away with a very disjointed display.

The bowlers had no rapport with the fielders and the captain gave up midway through the innings with his silly reactions to the lapses on the field. Ganguly's angry gestures did not help the youngsters with their confidence and quite steadily the West Indians established a firm control.

The West Indian batting matured at the right time. The opening pair was outstanding and the middle order thrived on the experience of Hooper. The contributions from Chanderpaul and Ridley Jacobs became valuable and set up the noose around the Indian batsmen.

Ganga produced an immaculate innings, just the kind which would please any captain. He batted with a purpose, matching Gayle in strokeplay which left the Indian bowling in tatters.

The manner in which Debasis Mohanty, Ashish Nehra and Zaheer Khan were whipped around in their first spells showed the Indian bowling in very poor light.

As the West Indians charged relentlessly, the Indian skipper panicked and it had an adverse affect on the side. Harbhajan Singh was in action in the ninth over of the innings and by the time the West Indians had faced 17 overs, six bowlers had been pressed by Ganguly in deperate attempts to check the flow of runs.

Mohanty proved disastrous and was worth just five overs this day. Nehra and Zaheer strove but poor fielding made their task tougher. Not one fielder hit the stumps and the bowling gained some respectability only when Sodhi and Harbhajan took the responsibility.

The West Indians batted to a plan. Gayle revelled in playing some stunning drives on the rise and left the fielding in a trance when he hammered the ball square. His was quite a telling assault.

Ganga was equally agile in picking the loose ball and drove straight and square with authority.

The right-left combination ruined the bowlers' length and Ganga grabbed the chance to carve a quality innings. He had survived at 66 when a catch by Ganguly at square leg was disallowed.

Ganga did nothing wrong until that fatal, and needless, swipe which ended at square leg. It was a classy innings by all standards and the dressing room acknowledged Ganga's performance gratefully. Gayle too had perished to ill- advised aggression but then the openers had done more than what was expected of them.

It was an ideal stage for Hooper and Chanderpaul and their running between the wickets made the Indian fielding look so sluggish. The Hooper-Chanderpaul association fetched the West Indies 108 runs and their tactics were given the desired momentum during this period. Chanderpaul was steady and Hooper attacking and the pair built on the splendid start of the openers.

Ganguly struggled to rotate the bowlers and was guilty of over- relying on Sehwag, who looked ordinary. But for Sodhi and Harbhajan, the West Indians might have plundered far more against an attack which looked tired in the death overs, conceding 71 runs in the last ten overs.

The Indian bowlers had let the side down badly this day when West Indian cricket got a big boost to its search of regaining lost glory.

India's Retinder Singh Sodhi is delighted having caught West Indian Wavell Hinds off his own bowling in the final of the triangular series on Saturday. - Photos: V.V. Krishnan

Corey Collymore exults after his appeal for a lbw against Saurav Ganguly is upheld.

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