The Hindu : Zaheer Khan needs to be nursed

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Mar 01, 2002

Sport

Sport - Cricket

Zaheer Khan needs to be nursed

Andy Flower's fine knock once again proved that Indian bowlers often look out of sorts against quality batsmen. Towards the end of the first day at Kotla, India did manage to regain some lost ground, but against better opposition, the team will have to cash in on the early breakthroughs.

Zaheer Khan was once again quite brilliant in the early part of the day, and the fact that he is able to extract life out of these docile pitches does him a lot of credit.

He is also a bowler who is not entirely dependent on the nature of the pitch, given his speed in the air and the ability to achieve reverse swing.

You expect the spinners to succeed in Indian conditions, but if a paceman is able to both trouble the batsmen and strike, he deserves more praise.

India has a long season ahead, especially away from home, and Zaheer will have to be handled carefully by the team- management. He is a match-winner and should be nursed well.

The Kotla pitch appears loaded in favour of batsmen and since Zimbabwe may fall short of 400 in the first innings, it is likely to struggle in this Test too.

On a surface that provided them with less assistance than in Nagpur, the Indian spinners disappointed though. To make matters worse, 'keeper Deep Dasgupta's work once again left a lot to be desired.

Touching on the selection of the Indian eleven for the Test, the wise men decided to leave out V.V.S. Laxman. This was a harsh move, for when it comes to sheer talent among the Indian batsmen, Laxman ranks next only to Sachin Tendulkar.

And he has not been an abject failure in Tests during recent times, as has been projected in certain quarters. Laxman made a disciplined 75 in the second Test against England at Ahmedabad and since then has batted just twice in two innings.

The point is, the selectors appear to be having different yardsticks for different people. One sincerely hopes the selectors apply the same set of rules when it comes to judging some other senior cricketers. If that happens, there might actually be a silver lining in Laxman's omission.

www.krishsrikkanth.com

-BY K. SRIKKANTH

Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Sport