Match abandoned without any play

By G. Viswanath

DURBAN, OCT. 31. There are dull days during a long cricket tour and the week gone by was one of them. Though it was quiet and pedestrian, it was a horrible one for the Indian team which has spent over six weeks in Southern Africa.

With the immediate business of playing the home team in the final of the Tri-series culminating in an unexciting manner, the team was looking forward to a three day fixture against the S.A. President's XI at Chatsworth, but a combination of factors like petty politics, poor infrastructure and spells of rain resulted in the match being abandoned without a ball being bowled.

The suffering party was the Indian team, though its management did not fault the logic of having only one first class match being before the first Test. It had to accept the fate because both the home and the visiting team's cricket boards had agreed to such a programme for which the teams were not a party. But the fact that it would have anyway got used to the conditions being here for more 40 days did not urge the team management to make a fuss about the itinerary.

The first five weeks had turned out to be very exacting for the team. With the objective of getting acclimatised to the conditions and to make an impact in the first part of the Summer Spice series, the team had advanced its arrival into this country by almost a week.

Although it lost to Kenya in a league match, the Indians reached the final after proving to be more than a worthy opponent to the home team. That it gave in without sustaining the combative spirit for another match made it feel low.

It is not always easy to recover from such a defeat as the one inflicted by the South Africans at the Kingsmead. Being away from home in such times also makes it extremely difficult to follow another pursuit other than cricket. After a day's rest, the team was back in business for practice at the Kingsmead and in the process of mentally preparing for the Test series. Perhaps it was happy to see new faces in left arm fast bowlers Zaheer Khan, Ashish Nehra, Connor Williams and Sameer Dighe.

There were speculations of rain interrupting the final and those in the knowledge of the climatic conditions said it would be postponed by a day. They were all proved wrong. But the whims of nature brought a standstill to the meaningful part of the Indian tour for three days.

The conditions were so bad at the Chatsworth Oval that the Indians did not even have to visit the venue for single day. The match was officially called off on Wednesday morning, which meant that India would take the field in the first Test in Bloemfontein without a decent hit for the batsmen and a good spell or two for Khan or Nehra.

So it was back to the routine of taking a short bus ride to Kingsmead and sweating it out there for three hours and more. Even this method changed on Wednesday morning with a majority of the players jogging to the Natal Cricket Association's ground which is less than a kilometre from the team hotel opposite the Indian Ocean. They did not engage themselves in any physical activity straightaway and opted for a group discussion, with the seniors offering their point of view about the way the team should approach the first Test.

They had the entire ground at their disposal to form three groups for fielding drills. There was this sight of Indian captain, Sourav Ganguly, `edging' Ajit Agarkar to the wicket- keeper Deep Dasgupta, Rahul Dravid, Venkatsai Laxman, Virendra Sehwag and Anil Kumble. There are some coaches who are against a specialist batsman being asked to give catch practice and Ganguly soon made way for Sehwag for another round of slip catching drill.

The team also tried to simulate a match like situation by batting and bowling without nets. The helplessness of the situation was quite visible as the team had to make do with the options available.

``We have to be mentally strong and prepare ourselves for the Test. We have to start thinking about the Test. It may be easy for the seniors, it's not the case with the newcomers who were not here for the one-day series.''

``Ashish Nehra has looked good at in the nets. Connor Williams, too. But nets are nets. Williams gets behind the ball appears to be technically sound. We have to look at the wicket at Bloemfontein before thinking about the composition of the team. We had an open session today in order to get collective inputs for the Test match. It's always useful to have such sessions,'' said Wright.

While the Indian team is keen to get to the venue of the first Test, the news from Bloemfontein, an Afrikaans- dominated province, is that the pitch may help the seamers. Score in excess of 400 have been made in the two Tests played at Goodyear Park, but South Africa's bowling coach, Corrie Van Zyl told a newspaper on Tuesday that the pitch may `surprise people'.

Zyl feels that the pitch will afford bounce and help fast bowlers. ``I think people are basing their assessment of the wicket on the history of the ground.'' But South Africa's coach Graham Ford doesn't quite agree with Zyl. He feels that the pitch might help the Indian spinners. A lot more will be said about the pitch in the next two days.

The Indians will return to a venue where they beat Kenya by ten wickets thanks to Agarkar and Srinath's good bowling. Having not got an opportunity to see Connor Williams bat in the three-day game, the touring side will be reluctant to play the Baroda left- hander straightaway in the Test.

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