India Crash And Burn, England Flower
By Gaurang
August 24 2011
After reaching the pinnacle of Test cricket in December 2009 and holding on to that spot, despite several spirited challenges, for nearly two years, team India were comprehensively toppled from their perch by a hungry and determined England who snatched the prize from India in the Test arena in quite emphatic fashion.
It was a shock to say the least for most Indian fans who were still basking in the reflected glory of the World Cup win which had given them both the title of ODI champions and Test champions, to see their team surrendering the Test crown in such abject fashion.
The reasons for the debacle are many, starting with the totally unimaginative scheduling of the BCCI, poor selections compounded by injuries sustained before and during the series, complacency by self-satisfied "Star" players who were still basking in the afterglow of the World Cup triumph, as well as adjusting to a new head coach, as the highly successful Gary Kirsten stepped down, right after the World Cup.
These were self-inflicted factors. The other key factor in the thumping meted out, of course, was the total preparation of the England side. From making sure all their key players were fit not just physically, but tuned in mentally to strive for the top. The credit for this in large part should go to Andy Flower, the coach and architect of this achievement. He has remained in the background along with the equally unobtrusive Graham Gooch, as batting coach, and David Saker, as bowling coach, but his influence and stamp are all over England's much more focused and unified approach.
More than the 0-4 scoreline, Indian fans will be particularly concerned about the seeming lack of fight, and the abject surrender that most of the players seemed to resigned to, except for the notable exception of Rahul Dravid with the bat and Praveen Kumar with the ball. In particular Indian fans will be very disappointed in the non-performance of Sachin Tendulkar who was a shadow of his former self, throughout the series. Was it the expectations of the 100th international 100, a totally aribitary media construct that was putting undue pressure on him? or was it that he has started to finally slow down as he approaches the age of forty? The pull out of Zaheer Khan with a hamstring injury just 13 odd overs into the series was also a huge blow, as was the King pair bagged by Virender Sehwag in Edgbaston. Both these events pointed to a deeper malaise, which allowed half-fit players to be selected for games. The picking of RP Singh out of the blue so to speak over Munaf Patel was another symptom of the dysfunction in the team. The ineffectiveness of Ishant Sharma and Sreesanth, who just a few series ago had humbled the mighty South Africans at Kingsmead, showed that India desperately were missing the services of someone like Venkatesh Prasad, under whom the same Indian fast bowlers outbowled Australian quicks in Australia and English pacers back in 2007. The injuries during the series to Gautam Gambhir and Harbhajan Singh were simply bad luck.
India now have a lot of hard questions ahead of them. The batting in Tests looks vulnerable especially at the top, unless Sehwag and Gambhir get fit fast. The middle order still looks good on paper with Dravid, Tendulkar and Laxman there, though the later two had a wretched time of it in England. The lower order however looks very vulnerable. Captain Dhoni, has shown that when the ball is moving around, he is no better than a tailender with the bat, and the batting of the rest of tail, with the exception of Amit Mishra looked very, very brittle. India next play Australia in Test matches, and the signs are that unless they take some bold steps they are likely to continue their slide down the rankings.
As for England, they have litterally and figuratively begun to flower, though there are some gaps in their side too. However, with sufficient teamwork and unity of purpose those are unlikely to be exposed soon. England next plays Pakistan in the middle east and then Sri Lanka in Sri Lanka, and despite the expectations of some that they will struggle, one feels that they have the ability to actually do quite well. If they pair up Greame Swann with Monty Panesar they have a spin attack capable of running through sides on helpful wickets, and neither Pakistan nor Sri Lanka, with the retirement of Muttiah Muralitharan have spinners who are significantly better than this pair.
So I expect England to hold on to its No. 1 ranking at least till next summer, when the current No. 2 team South Africa come visiting. Though from an Indian viewpoint nothing would be sweeter than if India snatch back the title when England then next visit India in 2012.
All of this may be moot soon if the ICC institutes a Test Championship as they have talked about, but in the absence of such a tournament the quest for the No. 1 ranking and unofficial title as World Test Champs is all that teams can aim for.
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Looks like England will be safe in the No. 1 spot for a while..
It was one sided contest and a good kick on India's backside that nothing can be taken for granted in sport
As for umpiring and DRS - big big failure and it shows that DRS will never work if intention is not right and technology is not perfect. Hope ICI takes some clue from this Disaster Review System and makes sure that it's perfectly tried and tested before introduction.
As for DRS - I have seen it in operation in its full form with hawk-eye etc and it has been almost perfect with very few notable errors (no system is fool proof). I think this half-ars* version the ICC have negotiated with the BCCI is not as good.
If the proper operation of DRS had been allowed - it wouldn't have made a difference to the outcome of the series, but it would have ensured more decisions were correct.
Also the run-out / stumping dismissal for Raina was not DRS. That was a normal decision.
So really your only beef with DRS is one decision for Dravid which was inconclusive. Hardly an indictment over a 4 test series.
As for DRS, it’s not perfect, but it’s the best solution at the moment and I think if everyone accepted that and that if the ICC actually got off their asses and did something about the flaws, then it would be something, but there’s no good bleating about “what ifs” if you decline to use it to begin with.
Indian cricket and criketers need to get with the program...
England came to the fight with a plan...and EXECUTED!!!! India came with a #1 ranking and the 'big names' ..no heart, no fitness and no unity ... and so they got a well deserved beating!!!
Rahul Dravid was the ONLY Professional who showed up on the Indian team ... well done sir!!!
they are a very good team.....their diffrentaior is their batting strength from #7 thru #10.
and their 3 seamers are quite handy.
well done another time we will fight better....and we will also follow the fortunes of Eng againsy Pak in UAE this winter
Their bowling-fielding display was most impressive.....
India I thought were on the back foot by their lack of bowling resources & lack of discipline in the field.....
Usually they were staring at formidable totals and that put pressure on the batters....
But comprehensively out-cricketed in all forms when all is said & done....
24 needed with a bunny coming in at 11? No problem!
The way umpires and biased DRS interpretation struck at vital points for England was despicable. We are still heavily dependent on the likes of Tendulkar and Dravid, and the fact that both got bad decisions makes a difference.
Still, a limp display by India in every department of the game and this one-sided series will hopefully wake them up to the deficiencies in the team. Our seamers have looked hopeless.
Everyone knows that no technology is perfect. But this is something very very suspicious.
DRS was pretty much like Indian team - uninterested, untested, unbothered and anyone can (mis)use em
![[:wor kid:]](/phorum-5.1.15/mods/smileys/images/13.gif "[:wor kid:]")
What it did highlight was that regardless of the referral to a THIRD umpire.. if that umpire is BIASED... it makes the whole DRS thing kind of irrelevant...because still Howlers are being made..
Let's analyse this a bit more.. VVS and VS have NEVER been that good in England.... why? Because they play away from the body, and are vulnerable to the swing...
Tendulkar was the BIG BIG disappointment... I read somewhere that despite his projecting his going over to UK was to practice for the upcoming series... in reality he had a HUGE business deal going on...and he was there mostly for that...
Gambhir was injured for most of the series missing one match and basically sleep walking or rather concussion walking through another...
Sehwag's case was hopeless he came back from totally being out of any batting touch to the middle of a Test series between the two of the top team in the worlds...and yet was unwilling to show any patience in the first three innings...he inevitabley paid the price...
So he has underperformed relative to expectations, despite time off, and despite pletny of recent practice in tests.
Yes he did well in Windies, but as I had pointed out at the time, that's a minnow team.
filtered 2002-2011 11 586 74 34.47 0 0 - - 0 10 0
and here is Sehwag in England...
2002-2011 6 278 106 27.80 1 1 1/32 63.00 0 8 0
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2011:08:25:17:46:09 by Birbal.
One thing I admired about English cricket they were relentless in the attack , no guard dropped after winning series.
One of the main blame has to go to selectors,
How can you select Yuvi on WC performance, Sehwag/zahere when not fit, Bhajji when not performing and mess with selection of Badri for ODI not test, not keeping Rohit for test and .....
Same with Sehwag...
However both VVS and Sehwag are not unduly bothered by bounce...andin fact like it bouncing nice and evenly... hence they do well in Australia...
Perhaps his eyesight is failing him?
Ponting can't pull any more, and admits it is due to age. He's about the same age as VVS.
VVS needs to reinvent himself like Sachin did, but very few people can do what Sachin has done.
I would say India should ever ever play Tests first up in SA, Eng and Oz
scratch that....
always play ODI's first.. get acclimitized and then play tests... the test only players can easily skip into the tour a bit early and be backup for ODI's too...
WTF are they doing playing 3 & 4 warm games before the ODI's...
Quote:kappax
In Hindsight..
I would say India should ever ever play Tests first up in SA, Eng and Oz
scratch that....
always play ODI's first.. get acclimitized and then play tests... the test only players can easily skip into the tour a bit early and be backup for ODI's too...
WTF are they doing playing 3 & 4 warm games before the ODI's...
yeah..This makes a lot of sense. Why don't they do like that?
May be BCCI thinks the otherway. They dont want to lose the ODIs often and kill the cash cow IPL.
1st test is the Boxing day test..
may at best have 1 or 2 warm up games...
Can understand with Oz tests end up first because of traditions around Boxing day test...
but in other countries they can easily play ODI's first..
even in Oz, they should have swapped whoever they are playing in Nov-Dec to Jan-Feb and played ODI's first...