with India's approach in the final innings of the Adelaide test. 20 odd overs with over 200 runs to get and the Indians thought it better to send Ishant Sharma out rather than declare.
What were we afraid of?
We just fed into the “Oz is great” myth.. This, after we ran all over them at Perth.. If THAT does not give us confidence, what legacy is Kumble talking about?
This was timid cricket. If we cant trust our boys to deliver, who can we trust? This is bad captaincy by Kumble.. I am disappointed..
Monday, January 28, 2008
Disappointed
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14 comments:
Homer,
I think the ineffectiveness of Bhajji and his own injury issue may have forced Kumble to take the safe option. Of course, I too dreamed of us declaring 200 runs in front with 30 overs to bowl and bundling the ozs for 103 - only problem is that we did not have M. Kartik playing in this game and Adelaide is no Wankhede...
Both the teams were afraid to lose.
if you dissapintment has mellowed down a bit please think other way around too...
if only to 'look aggressive' captain he had to declare than i am sorry coz if you think any decent team can be bowled out inside 30 overs sitting pretty on 2-1 lead is taking thinks too far...
when you are left with virtually 2 bowlers who can bowl and look like taking wickets...considering the injury scare of kumble and form of bhajji i think it would have been playing at the hand of oz just for the sake of it (looking aggressive)...coz they had nothing to loose...they would have definetly gone for the crack and if some wickets fallen in prsuits would have easily discarded it...earing praise in both way for their aggressive intentions...and laghed off at india with possible 3-1 lead for 'seeing things'...
the legacy kumble is talking about is when in for years time everyboday will look at this series as india coming in from behind and ending series 2-1 which could have been easily 1-1 with some common sense and without deadly fingers...rather than looking this series as that there was an indian team who started to see things in air and carried superficial agression too far...just because we 'the arm chairs critics' wanted them to...
I don't think there was a possibility for going for a win... doubt even if it was 200, the Aussie may not go at it... the stakes were high for them. Maybe he did not want to bowl again... but from whatever we have seen from Kumble, he is not a aggressive captain.
Prabu,
We did not even try. Thats what ticked me off
Cheers
I agree Ottayan..
straight point,
what you say makes sense but look at it this way - 226 to win from 22 overs - thats probably as safe as safe can be but we still did not elect to declare. I mean, how conservative can India be and will this conservatism come and bite us in a situation where adventure is the need of the hour?
If we cannot trust ourselves to risk a loss going for a win, we will have to content ourselves with dull draws.
Cheers
Scorpicity,
Yup.. I hope he opens up in the South Africa series - he is a captain with nothing to lose and if he can change our mindset and our approach to winning, that will be his greatest legacy.
Cheers
Playing aggressively is like doing drugs - its hard the first time, but then it gets easier.
homer,
that is the point...do you think you can win a test match against any decent test team by dismissing them inside 22 overs that too on such a flat track...
Well SP,
We did not back ourself in this test. We did not back ourselves to win at Kolkata against Pakistan ( despite leading by 302 on Day 4). We did not back ourselves to win at Newlands, the Oval and Bangalore.
We don't back ourselves to win at home or away. Question is - why?
Cheers
Aptly put Samir.. Bravo!
Really, whats the worst that could happen? You'll lose a match? C'mon. Whats the big deal? We lose matches all the time (sometimes because we don't play aggressively!). If on the other hand, we win one by playing aggressively, everyone will like it, and it'll rapidly turn into a habit. And Homer, the Bangalore declaration was worse in terms of timing and delaying. At Kolkata, we simply didn't bat fast enough. We could have declared on the fourth day by making sure we had scored another 40 runs (think about it, just another 40 runs, which these guys went out and scored on the fifth day, wasting valuable time). If you can't bat aggressively with a lead of 160, when are you going to bat aggressively (note, BTW, that in that innings our so-called power striker Dhoni, made 37 off *61* balls!).
Samir,
This is what I had written then.. Am in total agreement with you.
And the fun part is that the Indian team, whenever pushed in a corner or in strife, plays its best cricket! And yet, we don't seem to back ourselves - playing safe is the first option taken :)
Cheers
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