The lesser team lost at Delhi

Anil Kumble’s honeymoon with the Kotla does not look like going to end before he hangs his boots up. He has the perfect start to his imperfect timing of captaincy career by earning the man of the match award in his first outing as captain against the arch-rivals. Kumble is a seasoned campaigner and is expected to do a decent job at the helm if not spectacular. Nevertheless his captaincy in the 1^st test was spectacular. But more than him the cricket community needs to stay grounded because his master-stroke, as mentioned in most of the columns, of giving the new ball to Ganguly is not going to earn him a couple of wickets in one over everyday. So, rather than hailing his captaincy after just one show, let’s appreciate what we have seen and not increase our expectations more than required.

Honestly this Pakistani team is no match for this Indian team and India should have shut the game in the 1^st innings. Thanks to the Indian batsmen for making the match interesting. Pakistan is playing with one genuine wicket-taker and if our batsmen see his overs through, they can pile up huge totals. Sachin’s run-out in the first innings was unfortunate and after that Dravid should have focused more. He will be the first one to admit that he played a wrong shot considering the team situation in the first innings. Laxman and Dhoni made a good recovery. One logical decisiopn Kumble can take at the beginning of his captaincy career is to promote Laxamn to no. five. Two reasons for this: first Laxman is a better batsman than Ganguly. So, he deserves to bat higher than him. Second, Ganguly’s game fits more for the no. 6 to play with the tail-enders. With the tail Ganguly has the ability to give the ball some thumping which Laxman clearly lacks and believes in rotating the strike even with the tail-enders. You don’t need to look any further than the last Lord’s test to understand how well Dhoni managed his stay at the crease with the tail to save the match for India.

Karthik was predicted to have a great future because of the tenacity he showed in England. So, let’s not be critical of him at the first instance of failure. This series is going to be the true test of his character. People like Sehwag and Gambhir are knocking for another chance. Another reason is that he has never faced someone like Akhtar before. The selectors should have faith in his ability as he has shown a lot of promise till now. Hopefully, he will come out no later than Eden Gardens with flying colors.

Munaf Patel needs to grab this chance as his last hope of breath in international cricket at least to stay in the loop before selectors throw him into the domestic circuit for good. Expectantly the injury concerns of Sreesanth and RP Singh are trivial and they would last at least till the end of Australia test series.

Both teams were competing with each other for the number of mistakes in the Kotla test which eventually made the match interesting. Thankfully, Indian batsmen managed to keep the mistakes to the minimal in the 2^nd knock and India won comfortably. To be precise; the lesser team lost in the end. Hopefully, both teams would be able to raise their game at Kolkota and produce a more gripping contest.