England have done their homework well and I believe that Alastair Cook had already come to Mumbai and practised under Hanumant Singh. He is a young player and the way he has played in his debut match shows that he is going to have a long career in international cricket.
In the first innings he had played a very matured innings and today also he showed a great character to score his first Test hundred.
He plays with a straight bat and has a lot of time while striking the ball. Players who play late at the ball always have a great advantage as they can place the ball where ever they like and this is very much evident in Cook's batting.
He has shown that he can bat according to the situation and has great patience.
On the other hand Pietersen is an exciting and entertaining player. He likes to attack and this puts the opposition under pressure.
I have always said that Indian bowlers have no clue what is happening when the opposition batsmen start to attack. The same thing happened today also. Pietersen scored 87 runs in 110 balls and that is a very good strike rate in Test cricket.
He also hit a massive six of Kumble's bowling and that too against the spin.
The six showed that he has great timing and courage. Not many batsmen can play that kind of shot against Kumble.
All the bowlers looked ordinary thought the day. So many loose balls were bowled that the batsmen were never under any pressure.
The pitch was turning and also had a lot of rough. But both the Indian spinner waited for things to happen rather than making things happen. They bowled too much on the rough and left every thing on the pitch.
Kumble relies more on accuracy and bounce while Habhajan is a turner, yet none of them could pose any problem to the batsmen on a pitch which was helping them.
At one point of time Harbhajan was bowling with a short fine-leg, short mid-wicket and long-on. This showed that he himself was not confident of picking up the wickets.
Our spinners rely more on the the out side edge and close-in fielders to take wickets. But with a negative approach they could not make any impression today.
They waited for the batsmen to play sweep shots for taking wickets!
Coming to the fielding, the less said about it the better. How can a team expect to win a match if the fields have butter fingers. Catches were dropped by Rahul Dravid and Harbhajan Singh at crucial stages of the match.
Overall all of the above was the result of poor planning. The field setting was defensive and bad. The skipper did not try his options in the bowling department properly.
He could have used Sachin Tendulkar and Virender Sehwag, who have a knack of breaking partnership. Dravid seemed to be lost of ideas. He needs to be cool and think calmly as then only India can save the match.
From England's point of view thing have gone very well. They have got the Indians on the backfoot and must go for a win on the final day.
England should declare their innings in the morning and give their bowlers one full day to get India out. To score 360 odd runs from 90 overs that too on the last day of a Test match on a pitch that is turning is next to impossible.
I believe that Monty Panesar with his flatter trajectory could prove to be the key but India must watch out for the pacers too.
For India to save the match Virender Sehwag has to fire. If we see the recent history of Indian cricket whenever Sehwag has fired India have done well.
(Krish Srikkanth is a former skipper of Indian cricket team. He maintains a regular blog on IBNLive. His website is www.krishinfotek.com)
About the AuthorKrishnamachari Srikkanth Krishnamachari Srikkanth was one of the most destructive batsmen who could decimate the strongest and most fearsome attacks in the world by his vast r...Read Morefirst published:March 04, 2006, 19:59 ISTlast updated:March 04, 2006, 19:59 IST
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Great England batting and poor fielding coupled with poor planning by the Indians were the hallmark of the day's play.
England have done their homework well and I believe that Alastair Cook had already come to Mumbai and practised under Hanumant Singh. He is a young player and the way he has played in his debut match shows that he is going to have a long career in international cricket.
In the first innings he had played a very matured innings and today also he showed a great character to score his first Test hundred.
He plays with a straight bat and has a lot of time while striking the ball. Players who play late at the ball always have a great advantage as they can place the ball where ever they like and this is very much evident in Cook's batting.
He has shown that he can bat according to the situation and has great patience.
On the other hand Pietersen is an exciting and entertaining player. He likes to attack and this puts the opposition under pressure.
I have always said that Indian bowlers have no clue what is happening when the opposition batsmen start to attack. The same thing happened today also. Pietersen scored 87 runs in 110 balls and that is a very good strike rate in Test cricket.
He also hit a massive six of Kumble's bowling and that too against the spin.
The six showed that he has great timing and courage. Not many batsmen can play that kind of shot against Kumble.
All the bowlers looked ordinary thought the day. So many loose balls were bowled that the batsmen were never under any pressure.
The pitch was turning and also had a lot of rough. But both the Indian spinner waited for things to happen rather than making things happen. They bowled too much on the rough and left every thing on the pitch.
Kumble relies more on accuracy and bounce while Habhajan is a turner, yet none of them could pose any problem to the batsmen on a pitch which was helping them.
At one point of time Harbhajan was bowling with a short fine-leg, short mid-wicket and long-on. This showed that he himself was not confident of picking up the wickets.
Our spinners rely more on the the out side edge and close-in fielders to take wickets. But with a negative approach they could not make any impression today.
They waited for the batsmen to play sweep shots for taking wickets!
Coming to the fielding, the less said about it the better. How can a team expect to win a match if the fields have butter fingers. Catches were dropped by Rahul Dravid and Harbhajan Singh at crucial stages of the match.
Overall all of the above was the result of poor planning. The field setting was defensive and bad. The skipper did not try his options in the bowling department properly.
He could have used Sachin Tendulkar and Virender Sehwag, who have a knack of breaking partnership. Dravid seemed to be lost of ideas. He needs to be cool and think calmly as then only India can save the match.
From England's point of view thing have gone very well. They have got the Indians on the backfoot and must go for a win on the final day.
England should declare their innings in the morning and give their bowlers one full day to get India out. To score 360 odd runs from 90 overs that too on the last day of a Test match on a pitch that is turning is next to impossible.
I believe that Monty Panesar with his flatter trajectory could prove to be the key but India must watch out for the pacers too.
For India to save the match Virender Sehwag has to fire. If we see the recent history of Indian cricket whenever Sehwag has fired India have done well.
(Krish Srikkanth is a former skipper of Indian cricket team. He maintains a regular blog on IBNLive. His website is www.krishinfotek.com)
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