Laxman (217), Dravid (188) feast on West bowling

By G. Viswanath

SURAT, JAN. 20. There are batsmen in Indian domestic cricket and there is Venkatsai Laxman. The former are the types who graft for runs on featherbed pitches; the latter simply demolishes the bowlers once he crosses the psychological barrier of 20 runs and gets through with his twenty minutes in the crease.

On Saturday at the Lalbhai Contractor stadium, Laxman, who is so accustomed to converting to centuries into double and treble, came out with another signature effort of 217 seizing the opportunity when the West bowlers' wherewithal had considerably weakened and appeared to have lost purpose.

His captain Rahul Dravid, who dug deep into his reserves to play a long innings, fell a dozen runs short of a double century. South's batting supremacy reached a high with Laxman and Dravid putting on 409 runs which was some 58 runs adrift of the world record (467 between Andrew Jones and Martin Crowe against Sri Lanka in 1990) for the third wicket and one run short of India's best for the third wicket between Lala Amarnath and Rusi Modi for India XI verses the Rest in the 1946-47 season. But their great effort bested the partnership for all wickets in the Duleep Trophy championship.

South had lost its second wicket (Sadagopan Ramesh) at stroke of tea on Friday when leg spinner Sairaj Bahutule bowled the rampaging left hander in the 34th over.

The home team did not get another one for nearly 91 overs and six hours and fifteen minutes and it actually came as a surprise when Hrishikesh Kanitkar bowled Dravid for 188 (375 mts, 292 b, 22x4, 1x6). The offspinner got the wicket when South's score was 564.

Four runs after Dravid's exit, Laxman (217, 404 mts, 286b, 25x4, 2x6), provided home town boy Lalit Patel and his supporters reason to rejoice.

He edged the medium pacer to wicketkeeper Nayan Mongia. Dravid applied his team's first innings closure at 595 for four wickets, a good 219 runs more than West's first innings total of 376. Most of it was made between lunch and tea and a chunk of it coming off part time bowler Jacob Martin who was pounded for 33 runs in three overs including a stunning swat back six by Laxman.

West skipper Mongia, per se, had only thin bowling resources to look at. The pace of Agarkar only benefitted Laxman and Dravid.

There was never a doubt that the ball would race to the fence once they made contact with the ball; only the shots varied from the drive and flick to the cut, pull and hook.

Leg spinner Bahutule suffered because he did not have another specialist spinner to support. Even then he was unlucky to see a chance go abegging when Dravid was on 91; Vinod Kambli did not go down at slip to latch on to the sharp edge. Bahutule did not hide his disgust. This was a rare occasion when the Mumbai spinner had beaten Dravid of the pitch. Thereafter it was a chanceless effort from Dravid.

Laxman reached his century five minutes before the first hour of the morning session had gone by; at the stroke of the hour, Dravid made his century.

West took second new ball immediately after the 85th over, but it only increased the tempo, Laxman and Dravid making the most of the flat deck on which Agarkar's deliveries came on nicely to be driven on the off side and cut and pulled.

India's coach John Wright could not stop praising the innings of Laxman. ``He is in great touch. What a lovely innings,'' he said. Dravid, too, must have been delighted with his campaign, playing his first match in more than a month's time.

Having conceded the first innings points to Central and North, West now faces the prospect of buckling under pressure on Sunday and losing the match. Dravid made one change in the last over; he brought back offspinner Kapoor from the end Venkatapathy Raju, bowled five overs and left hander Connor Williams fell to close- in Sriram.

South and Dravid will strive hard for a win. It will have a minimum of 90 overs to exploit the declining surface.

The scores: West Zone - 1st innings: 376.

South - 1st innings: S. Sriram c Mongia b Siddiqui 38, S. Ramesh b Bahutule 99, V. V. S. Laxman c Mongia b Patel 217, R. Dravid b Kanitkar 188, S. Joshi not out 17, H. Badani not out 9, Extras (b-1, lb-4, nb-19, w-3) 27, Total (for 4 wkts in 133 overs) 595.

Fall of wickets: 1-139, 2-155, 3-564, 4- 568.

West bowling: Agarkar 23-4-80-0, Siddiqui 33-4-153-1, Patel 28-3- 124-1, Bahutule 37-4-151-1, Kanitkar 8-1-47-1, Martin 3-0-33-0.

West Zone - 2nd innings: C. Williams c Sriram b Kapoor 43, N. Mongia batting 21, Total (for 1 wkt in 20.4 overs) 64.

Fall of wicket: 1-64.

South Zone bowling: Ganesh 5-0-23-0. Shahabuddin 3-0-13-0, Kapoor 4.4-0-13-1, Raju 5-2-10-0, Joshi 3-1-5-0.

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