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Mark Ramprakash needs two hundreds to join an exclusive group of 24 batsmen to have scored a century of centuries. He and others talked about the landmark moment

Patrick Kidd30-Apr-2008
‘Five years ago I thought I would have my work cut out. I couldn’t have predicted the last two years would go so well’ © Getty Images
History tends to repeat itself but some things in cricket we can say with near certainty will never happen again. It seems implausible that another Test batsman will average almost 100 over a career. It is unlikely that many men will play Test cricket into their forties, let alone their fifties like Wilfred Rhodes. The days of the five-month tour are past. And, as a colleague from Oldham has been known to growl, you can throw in Lancashire ever winning the County Championship again too. He would love to be proved wrong on that.To the endangered species list we will soon be able to add another “never again”. When Mark Ramprakash, Surrey’s evergreen batsman, makes his third century this summer he will join a select band of 24 men who have scored 100 first-class hundreds. He will be the first for a decade and the last possibly for ever.Scoring 100 hundreds requires more than longevity. You need brilliance, luck and stubbornness. Plenty of great names have ended a long career without quite crossing that line. Mike Gatting, Maurice Leyland and Gordon Greenidge each played for more than 22 years but could not do it. Ramprakash, 38, may also have been left frustrated if it hadn’t been for an astounding last two seasons in which he made 18 hundreds.These days, with a slimmed-down Championship schedule and the proliferation of international fixtures, Ramprakash’s achievement is an anachronism. In 21 years as a first-class player, he has played only 664 innings, yet the fact that he has got to 98 hundreds is due to an extraordinary conversion-rate. To make a comparison, CB Fry, Garfield Sobers and Rohan Kanhai, among the top drawer of history’s great batsmen, all played more than 600 innings, yet the first reached only 94 first-class hundreds, the latter two 86 apiece.”There’s no doubt that the landmark is on my mind,” Ramprakash tells . “I’m really looking forward to this season for a lot of reasons but there is certainly a strong incentive to get to 100 hundreds. I remember five years ago [when he reached 66] people were talking about it and I thought I would have my work cut out. I couldn’t have predicted that the past two years would have gone so well.”As Ramprakash points out, “there are a lot of fantastic names on the list”. It begins with WG Grace, who reached his 100th hundred when he was 46, and continues through the likes of Jack Hobbs, Wally Hammond, Don Bradman, Viv Richards and Graham Gooch.Graeme Hick was the last to reach the landmark, ten years ago at Worcester.”It was more than a relief to reach the landmark,” Hick says. “It stopped people asking ‘When’s he going to do it?'” The end for Hick came in a hurry, with two centuries against Sussex at New Road taking him from 98 to 100. In doing so he became the second youngest to reach the milestone – two weeks behind Hammond – and took fewer innings than anyone bar Bradman and Denis Compton.Hick gained the historic runs by pushing Mark Robinson for two through midwicket, at which point Tom Graveney, another Worcestershire hero who had reached his own 100th hundred at New Road 34 years earlier, emerged from the pavilion with a bottle of champagne and two glasses. Graveney dropped one of the glasses on the wicket, where it broke, but the other was presented to Hick later.”I’ve got it framed at home,” Hick said. “There’s still some dried champagne residue on the glass. It was very enjoyable to score the runs at New Road as Worcestershire have been a fantastic family for me. I remember the wicket was pretty flat and Vikram Solanki also made a hundred, his first in the Championship, so that made the day special for both of us.” Several members of the “100 Club” were lucky enough to score their historic century on home turf and Ramprakash, who has been with Surrey since 2001 and is in his benefit year, admitted that “the thought has flickered through my mind of making theruns at The Oval, but I’m taking nothing for granted”.
Graeme Hick: ‘It was more than a relief to reach the landmark. It stopped people asking “When’s he going to do it?”’ © Getty Images
At least Ramprakash will not have the uncertainty that Gooch did. “There was a bit of confusion over whether a hundred I scored on the rebel tour of South Africa in 1982 was first-class,” Gooch says. “Ten years later, it was noticed that I was getting near to100 and when I scored a hundred at Cuttack, I thought I’d made it. Then someone told me I hadn’t. It was a bit of a cock-up.”Gooch returned to England and made his 100th hundred (again) against Cambridge University at Fenner’s at the start of the following summer, raising a few eyebrows when after reaching three figures with a six over long-on he immediately walked off, having “retired out” at 105. “I went straight home after the match; there was no celebration,” he says.Gooch was not the only batsman to find his record altered by statisticians. The firstmember of the 100 Club, Grace, reached what he thought was his 100th hundred atBristol in 1895. The celebration was similar to that which greeted Hick’s – except it wasa magnum of champagne – and there was much jubilation. And then, many years later,two of his early hundreds were ruled invalid Fortunately, Grace had gone on to reach 126hundreds, so the deduction did not cost him his membership of the club.Conversely, both Herbert Sutcliffe and Hobbs were granted two extra hundredsafter runs they made for the Maharajkumar of Vizianagram’s XI in Ceylon were ruledfirst-class. Although Hobbs’ total of 197 first-class hundreds is as much a common-lorestatistic as Bradman’s Test average, he actually made 199.Ramprakash said his most satisfying hundred had been his third, in 1990 for Middlesex against Somerset at Uxbridge. “We were set about 360 to win in 60 overs [actually 370 in 69] and got there in the last over,” Ramprakash said. “I remember I broke a few bats while making 146 and I needed 12 off the last over. It was especially important as Middlesex won the Championship that year.”Gooch has fond memories of his maiden ton. “It was 1974 against Leicestershire at Chelmsford and they had Garth McKenzie, who I had watched bowl for Australia when I was a kid ten years earlier,” Gooch said. “I remember I hit a six off McKenzie into the hospital that used to be by the ground and immediately apologised to him.”Two players reached their 100th hundred in a Test – Zaheer Abbas against India at Lahore and Geoffrey Boycott at Headingley – but the chances of Ramprakash doing the same are slim. “Plainly, they don’t want to come back to me,” he says. “I’ve told them that I’m fit and playing well but I’m not playing to please the selectors. I just want to enjoy my remaining days.”For Graveney, who became the 15th man to join the club in 1964, that idea is poppycock. “Ramprakash should be playing for England now,” he says. But perhaps Graveney is remembering the days when it was possible to earn an England recall at the age of 39. Graveney’s 100th hundred came at New Road when he was 37.”I remember I got a sudden run of scores and made three hundreds in four matches,”Graveney says of his feat in 1964. “I was on 99 and David Larter bowled a very goodover at me. Finally he sent down a bouncer, I went to hook and got a bottom edge overshort leg and ran a single. It was not an impressive shot.
Geoff Boycott is mobbed after getting to his 100th hundred in 1977 against Australia, the first of two – Zaheer Abbas was the other, a decade later – to reach the landmark in Tests © PA Photos
“Keith Andrew was behind the stumps and just before Larter bowled he said, ‘Doyou want us to give it to you?’ I would have loved to have said yes. It was a differentgame in those days and sometimes you did someone a favour. In Sydney once, KeithMiller gave me my hundred. I was on 97 and he bowled me a slow long hop, which Imissed, so he sent me another one. But then we were great friends.”Graveney was eventually recalled by England and made four more hundreds forhis country, including the one that he rates as the best of all his 122 centuries. “It was ona turner at Lord’s against India in 1967 and I was batting with my great friend Basil [D’Oliveira]. We put on 108 together in the morning and I had 80 of them. At lunch Basil told me to piss off because I was making him look bad. I made 151 and when I was out the last five wickets fell for nothing.”As Graveney points out, the number of matches played these days militates against anyone reaching 100 hundreds. Of active players, Justin Langer has 80, Matthew Hayden 79 and Stuart Law 78, but none of them will play for long enough to get to 100. Ricky Ponting has 68 but will need to play until he is 40 if he continues to score hundredsat the present rate; Robert Key (35 hundreds) is the most likely of the present county crop, but at 28 time is short even for him.The fact that Marcus Trescothick has scored only 28 first-class hundreds – 14 of them for England – illustrates a point that Gooch makes. “These days if you are good you will get picked by England and then you will simply not play many games,” he says. “Alastair Cook is young enough and talented enough to get to 100 hundreds – but if he does he will be 40 and have scored 70 of those hundreds for England.”

The world’s top-ranked allrounder is a Bangladeshi who has oodles of self-belief to go with his undoubted talent

Utpal Shuvro06-Feb-2009
Shakib picks up yet another match award © AFP
It’s one of cricket’s ironies that one of its best allrounders of the moment mighthave been lost to football instead, but for several turns of fate. Like every other boy in the provincial town of Magura, 170 miles from Dhaka, Shakib al Hasan was a regular on the playing field whenever he got a chance but the big draw was always football. His father had played the game for Khulna Division and a cousin had gone on to represent Bangladesh, so football more or less ran in the family.Cricket was on the sporting curriculum though, and the fashion among the youthwas “tape-tennis” cricket. Shakib was fairly proficient and was often “hired” toplay for different villages. One such game changed his life.A local umpire called Saddam Hossain was impressed by the kid’s prowess and called him to practise with the Islampur Para Club, one of the teams in the Magura Cricket League. Shakib turned up and, as was his wont, batted aggressively and bowled fast. That was what he knew best. Then, suddenly, inexplicably, he began bowling spin – and had the batsmen totally flummoxed.He made the cut for the Islampur team and picked up a wicket with the first ball on his Magura Cricket League debut – his first-ever delivery with a proper cricket ball.It could sound a bit too pat but Shakib’s journey from Magura to the top of the ICCrankings for allrounders – the first Bangladesh player ever to top any ICC ranking – hasn’t happened overnight, nor has it been the result of any one dramatic or magical moment. It’s been a long journey, with its share of ups and downs, happiness and sorrow, laughter and tears, since he first held a bat eight-odd years ago.Shakib’s eyes drift away as he narrates his story, building up a tapestry of imagesand defining moments. Throughout, there is surprise that a boy who didn’t play aproper game of cricket till he was in his teens could be the world’s top allrounder.The talent-scouting camp at Bangladesh Krira Shikkha Protishtan (BKSP) comes firstto his mind. His ability had been noticed at a one-month camp in Narail before he waschosen for the six-month training course at BKSP. He remembers his father warninghim about neglecting his studies, as well as the persuasive tactics of the BKSPcoach, “Bappi sir” (Ashraful Islam Bappi). “Uncle, let him go. He has a future incricket,” Bappi pleaded with Shakib’s father.Life at the BKSP camp was good, with Shakib managing to enroll himself in class eightunder special consideration. His skills with bat and ball helped him overcome theadversities of a new environment.His next break came when he was called up in the absence of one of the regulars in adomestic Under-15 fixture. His century off 52 balls was enough to earn him a placein the national U-15 team, followed by, with metronomic frequency, steps up to theU-17, U-19 and Bangladesh A levels, and then to the national team.And then one day last month he got a phone call from a journalist. “You are theworld’s No. 1 allrounder, according to the one-day rankings published today. Can Ihave your reactions?”What could he possibly say? Such emotions cannot be put in words. From the day heseriously took up cricket, this had been his dream: of reaching the top – not justhimself as a player but his team as well. His job was only half done, but it was agreat leap forward.You can imagine Shakib talking to the journalist – “I’m just so happy. My dream’scome true, etc etc,” he would have warbled in a quivering voice. But if you thoughtthat, you really don’t know Shakib very well.Of course he was delighted, and said as much, before adding: “What reactions do I have? Well, it hasn’t quite sunk in. Can I think on it through the night and let you know tomorrow?”It’s this quality, of not getting carried away, of being in control of hisemotions, that made him stand out among the other boys at BKSP, a trait noticed bythe coach Nazmul Abedin Fahim as well. “A lot of people say that Shakib has littleemotion, but he is quite an emotional lad. He just possesses this remarkableability to control his emotions.”Fahim remembers the day he first recognised Shakib’s immense talent as a cricketer.Fahim was in charge of the Bangladesh U-15 team touring India. The first match, againstthe Bengal U-15s, in the industrial town of at Kalyani, was played on a brand newpitch. The tourists lost early wickets but Shakib stuck around to score a match-winning 69. It became a habit on the tour – early dismissals followed by a rescue act by Shakib.Shakib has repeatedly been asked one particular question at press conferences: “Are you a batting allrounder or a bowling allrounder?” The reply is part laconic, part genuine uncertainty: “I am a cricketer Fahim was also in charge of the Bangladesh team – of which Shakib was a member – atthe U-17 Asia Cup in India in 2004. Those around at the time recall vividly theoccasion when, asked by a journalist to name the team’s best bowler, batsman andfielder, Fahim replied “Shakib” to all three.Theirs was a long-standing relationship. Fahim, a veteran coach at BKSP, had mentored several generations of Bangladeshi cricketers but he always believed Shakibwas in a different class. “He may not be the most technically gifted of the manystudents I taught. But he’s the best when one considers the total package. Atcricket’s topmost level the game is played more in the mind, and from the mentalperspective he is way above everyone,” says Fahim.Habibul Bashar, who was the Bangladesh captain when Shakib made his internationaldebut on the 2006 tour of Zimbabwe, seconds Fahim. “He [Shakib] is mentally very tough and he can deal with success very simply as well. This is why he is so consistent,” says Bashar.It’s not just about dealing with success and failure on the field; Shakib has a verysimplistic view on matters away from the game as well. “I don’t brood over issues.The more you think about it, the more complex it becomes. I want to keep everythingsimple. And I don’t mean just the game. Matters off the field may not be within mycontrol as well, so why lose sleep over things you can’t control? What I can do is togive my best every time.”Backing up his clear understanding of what he can do is a firm belief in theability to do so. Together they set him apart from the other players in the team. “His biggest strength as a cricketer lies in backing his own ability. Criticism andanalyses have never stopped him from playing his own game,” says Fahim.Maybe it’s “a high degree of self-belief” as the current Bangladesh captainMohammad Ashraful says. “Though he [Shakib] doesn’t bowl too much at practice, he always delivers during a match. Now that’s only possible if you have tremendous belief inyourself.”More than the self-belief, perhaps, is Shakib’s resolve to be the best. “Wheneveranyone outperforms me, whether in academics or sport, I tell myself that if he coulddo it, so can I. Whenever someone from the team is adjudged Man of the Match, I feelthe honour could have been mine as well, It’s not jealousy – my team-mates’ successobviously gives me a lot of joy – but one basic question: ‘If he could, why couldn’tI?'”So he’s got the self-confidence and the determination. What more do you need forsuccess? Hard work? Shakib will definitely work as hard as he can. But MohammadSalauddin, his bowling and mental-strength guru – another teacher from his BKSPdays, and the current Bangladesh assistant coach – doesn’t consider hard work akey element in Shakib’s success. “I wouldn’t call Shakib a hard worker. Hisbiggest talent is that he picks up things very easily. He has a very logical brain.”Salauddin remembers an incident from Bangladesh’s tour of South Africa lastNovember. “On the first day of the first Test, at Bloemfontein, Shakib didn’t get asingle wicket. I told him to flight the ball but he was apprehensive, thinking he’dget hit all over the park.”But I know him. So the next day, in the bus on the way to the stadium, I started reading a chapter on flight in spin bowling. He asked me what I was reading. I told him it was just some points on the usefulness of flight in spin bowling.”Shakib immediately picked up what I was trying to say. That morning he gave the ballair and flight and got his wickets.” After ending the first day with no wickets from25 overs, his day two figures read: 13 overs, 35 runs and five wickets.”That spell sums up Shakib’s bowling over the past four months – the best of hiscareer, the most successful and, at times, magical. It was also a bit of a surprise.He began his one-day career as a No. 4 batsman, and in his 60 innings till date, hehas batted lower than five on only a handful of occasions. In Tests he has batted mostly at No. 7, but all along, he was always known as a batting allrounder. That was till the home series against New Zealand in October last year.
Start as you mean to go on: Shakib gets the first of his seven wickets in the first innings against New Zealand in Chittagong last year © AFP
Just before that two-Test series, Bangladesh coach Jamie Siddons suddenly announcedthat Shakib would be playing as a specialist spinner – and that’s the rolehe has been fulfilling since then. In the first innings of the first Test, inChittagong, he picked up 7 for 37, the best bowling figures by any Bangladeshiplayer in Tests. That was the appetiser; the main course came on the tour of SouthAfrica.His five- and six-wicket hauls in the two Tests against South Africa were asignificant milestone, considering greats like Shane Warne and Anil Kumble hadfailed to do as much against those opponents, and even Muttiah Muralitharan achieved it just the once. Shakib’s performance drew the praise of former Australian legspinner Kerry O’Keefe, who said he was the “world’s best finger spinner at the moment”.Another five-for followed in the next Test, at home against Sri Lanka, which gave him five or more wickets in an innings in three successive Tests, an accomplishment Bangladesh’s old spin spearhead Mohammad Rafique would have been proud of.Those recent successes – and, no doubt, his ascent to the top of ICC rankings – haveled to his being repeatedly asked one particular question at press conferences: “Areyou a batting allrounder or a bowling allrounder?” The reply is part laconic, partgenuine uncertainty: “I am a cricketer.”Asked where he sees himself at the end of his career, he replies: “I never go by records, statistics and rankings. I believe one must take into account all aspects of the game. I want the world to remember me as proficient in all three categories – batting, bowling and fielding. Bowlers will think twice when I bat, similarly batsmen will be wary of my skills with the ball, and they will hesitate to take runs when the ball comes my way on the field.”The realisation of his dream will no doubt require Shakib to keep his feet firmly onthe ground despite all the adulation and acclaim. Will he be able to? He breaks intoa wry smile. “Cricket is not just my profession, it’s the only way I can realise myother dreams. If I shine, everything will fall into place – the ranking will begood, the rewards will flow in.”Self-satisfaction does not feature in Shakib’s dictionary, though he is proud to beofficially acknowledged as among the world’s best. It is not just the personalachievement that is important to him but proving that someone from Bangladesh canbecome the world’s top performer. The sky’s the limit, Shakib al Hasan says, andhe’s started his journey.

Plays of the day from day four at Chittagong

Andrew Miller in Chittagong15-Mar-2010Ball of the day
If anyone was going to give England a scare in this contest, that anyone had to be Tamim Iqbal. His technique, temperament and the power of his strokeplay have set him apart from his peers in this series, but for the second time in the match, his off stump fell victim to an exceptional delivery. On Sunday it was Tim Bresnan who zipped past his defences; today it was Graeme Swann with a beauty that looped, dipped, gripped and spun. Nevertheless, he departed with a match total of 100 runs, despite twice attracting balls that would have nailed any player in the world. As and when his luck turns, he has the game to seek his vengeance.Innings of the day
Junaid Siddique was playing for his place when Bangladesh began their second innings. After a second-ball duck in his only appearance in the one-day series, and inconclusive scores of 16 and 37 in last week’s three-day warm-up, he needed a score to convince the doubters, especially after his limp dismissal to Stuart Broad’s bouncer in the first innings. But right on cue, he dug in for his highest Test score since Bangladesh’s victory over West Indies in Kingstown, to haul his country’s rearguard into a fifth and final day.Aberration of the day
Shakib Al Hasan is ranked as one of the top allrounders in world cricket, but his batting has not been at its best on this tour. He was off-colour in the one-dayers (albeit a touch unlucky as well), while in the first innings of this match he was suckered by Graeme Swann and tempted into a monstrous mow. A similar mindset afflicted him second-time around, as he sized up a sweep from only his third delivery, but was beaten in the flight and pinned lbw for 4 – although replays suggested the ball had come off the glove. After a disciplined third-wicket stand of 54, three wickets had tumbled for 11, and once again Bangladesh’s propensity for self-destruction had resurfaced.Spell of the day
Many a true word is said in jest. Following his five-wicket haul in the first innings, Graeme Swann reiterated his oft-repeated statement that he’d like to bowl, not just in tandem with a solitary spinner, but with five or six in the same side, “because I’ve grown up believing we should rule the world because we’re a higher species than the seamers”. To judge by England’s tactics on the fourth day, Alastair Cook is inclined to agree. Swann wheeled his way through 29 overs out of 75 in Bangladesh’s second innings, including 25 in a row either side of tea. He didn’t get the rewards that he had reaped first time around, but it wasn’t for want of trying.Desperation of the day
Few would have imagined Jonathan Trott (no wickets in 11 Test overs to date) being called upon to break the resistance of Bangladesh, but then that’s what happens when you opt for four bowlers on a shirt-front. His middling medium-pacers didn’t exactly ruffle the feathers of the well-set pairing of Junaid and Mushfiqur Rahim, although there was one brief moment of excitement. On 36, Mushfiqur stepped back into a pull and pushed off for a single, but as he did so, his leg bail dropped to the ground. For a split-second Trott believed he’d fluked his maiden Test wicket, until Matt Prior pointed out he was the one who’d caused the damage, rather than Mushfiqur’s heel.Stat of the day
It’s often said that Ian Bell cashes in when the going is good, although those jibes dissipated a touch in South Africa this winter, when he was widely credited for his role in both the victory at Durban and the rearguard at Cape Town. But there’s not a lot of hiding from his average against Bangladesh. In 2005, in his first full series as an England Test cricketer, he racked up 227 runs without being dismissed, including a hefty 162 in the second match at Durham. In Chittagong, he has now added scores of 84 and 39 not out, to take his average to a well-rounded, but somewhat obese, 350.

Plays of the Day from the IPL game between Kings XI Punjab and Mumbai Indians in Mohali

Jamie Alter at the PCA Stadium in Mohali09-Apr-2010Love hurts
Punjab made five changes to their playing XI today. The first to make an appearance was Love Ablish, the highest wicket-taker for his state side, Punjab, in the last Ranji Trophy season. Ablish would have known this venue pretty well, but today he bowled a nervous first over in the IPL, perhaps swayed by the fact that there was a full-house watching him run in. His first ball was short and wide and cut away for four. His fourth and fifth suffered the same fate as Ablish struggled to locate his radar.Sangakkara the professional
Kumar Sangakkara has had a rough time in the field this IPL. But restored to where he should be, Sangakkara pulled off a smart stumping to deliver Punjab their third wicket. Piyush Chawla beat Saurabh Tiwary with a googly and even as the batsman’s back foot dragged back Sangakkara had broken the sticks. Immediately he was away in celebration, confident of his handiwork. Replays soon confirmed that.The smiling assassin
Piyush Chawla turned in his best outing of the season, and his third wicket was the biggest. Chawla earned plenty of recognition when he bowled Sachin Tendulkar with a clever googly in a Challenger Trophy match in 2005, and tonight he repeated the feat. The ball was tossed up and landed on a length, Tendulkar missed a big sweep and was bowled. Chawla allowed himself a tiny smile as he raised his arms in triumph.The perfect dab
Barath has carved out quite a reputation for classical strokeplay, but the best shot he played tonight was a masterpiece of improvisation. When Harbhajan tossed one up full outside off stump, Barath made room, reached for the ball and steered it from almost in front of Ambati Rayudu’s gloves. It sped away, neatly beating the men at gully and third man. Perfect.No freebies
Punjab have been unable to tie up loose ends – they bowled 17 extras the last time they played Mumbai – but tonight their bowlers pretty much had things in charge, so much so that the first extra didn’t come until the middle of the 15th over – and it was a leg bye.Some love lost
Later in the innings, Ablish put down a catch at long-off which didn’t go down well with the bowler, Brett Lee. Kieron Pollard absolutely smashed the ball and the offering came hard and flat at Ablish, who was nearly taken apart by the impact. The catch went down and Lee stared at his fielder, shaking his head. It was a harsh reaction.You hit, I york
Irfan Pathan tried a short ball at Pollard but at his gentle pace it was easy for the batsman to sit back and pull past midwicket for four. The next ball was a gem, however, and one that reminded viewers of an Irfan from a different era. And it had to be, because Sangakkara had dropped midwicket back and brought up fine leg and third man. Irfan delivered the perfect yorker, which snuck under Pollard’s bat and hit the base of off stump.Six thrills
Adam Gilchrist once noted that the utmost satisfaction about hitting a six is that the batsman knows that it’s gone the distance a fraction of a second before the crowd does. JP Duminy would’ve really appreciated that feeling today. Until the 19th over, Mumbai had not cleared the ropes once, but when Lee bowled length, Duminy reached across his stumps and drag-swept the ball for a flat six over square leg. The success of the shot was in the exceptional use of Duminy’s wrists.Slow motion
Ablish was given a big task in his first game of this IPL: bowling the final over of Mumbai’s innings. Given his nerves, this had the potential of being an expensive over, but the rookie used the slower ball to good effect. After two singles he got rid of Harbhajan Singh, who spooned a catch to Sangakkara, and cut down further on pace to bowl Ryan McLaren first ball. The over ended with Sangakkara collecting and running-out Duminy. It had cost just four runs and Ablish’s first bowl in the IPL had ended a full turn from how it began.Out or not?
Mahela Jayawardene drove a delivery from Lasith Malinga in the air toward mid-on, where Saurabh Tiwary took the catch. After tumbling over, Tiwary started to throw the ball up in celebration but it slipped out of his hand. Jayawardene had started to walk off but Adrian Barath called him back as there was some doubt about whether Tiwary had been in control. The umpires got together for a chat and it was soon decided that the fielder had been in control for enough time, and no replay was called for. Technology: it’s either too much or too little.

Plays of the day from game three of the Asia Cup, between Bangladesh and Sri Lanka in Dambulla

Siddarth Ravindran in Dambulla18-Jun-2010Quick off the blocks
Sri Lanka signalled their intentions early in the match: Upul Tharanga caressed the first ball through extra cover for three, and Tillakaratne Dilshan followed that up with a crash to the extra cover boundary. Bangladesh’s openers did one better as they set about chasing down the biggest total made in Dambulla – Tamim Iqbal sent the first three deliveries to the boundary. Sri Lanka’s men at the top carried on for far longer, Bangladesh’s were separated in the third over.Some more cheer power
As if the enthusiastic and tireless trumpet-and-drum combos scattered across the stands weren’t providing enough support, the organisers hired two sets of cheerleaders as well. These weren’t the imported pom-pom waving, go-go boots wearing American stereotype of a cheerleader so common at the IPL, but traditionally-attired Kandyan dancers, who added a touch of local flavour to the proceedings. By the end of the match, Sri Lanka’s most famous cheerleader, the 68-year-old Percy Abeysekera, joined them for a jig as well.Beware the part-time offspinner
In their first game of the tournament, Bangladesh were cleaned up by the gentle offbreaks of Virender Sehwag, who finished with career-best figures. Today, it was the turn of another dashing opener who moonlights as an offspinner to cause havoc. It wasn’t even the tail that folded up against Dilshan, three top-order batsmen being undone by him.Different strokes
When you are in one of the deepest troughs of your international career, with your place in the side in jeopardy, you would be well-advised to give up high-risk shots that have previously got you in trouble. Tell that to Mohammad Ashraful, who after a painfully slow innings in which he showed few signs of attacking intent, decided to bring out the reverse-sweep, only to miss and be struck dead in front.Malinga’s special delivery
Lasith Malinga is one of the most popular cricketers around. Every time he runs in he is accompanied by an ominous howl from the crowd, increasing in volume as he approaches the stumps. His fans were disappointed after the Bangladesh top-order managed to deny him a wicket but Lasith’s legion had their moment when he delivered one of his special, pinpoint yorkers that homed in on Naeem Islam’s boot. Naeem tried to get his toes out of the way but the ball swung in so viciously that he fell over after being hit in front.

A compilation of statistical highlights from the nine World Cup tournaments

Madhusudhan Ramakrishnan19-Feb-2011Glenn McGrath: most wickets and most maiden overs in World Cups•Getty Images121.17 – The best strike rate for a batsman in World Cup matches
Among batsmen who have played at least 10 matches and scored 300 runs, Lance Klusener’s strike rate is comfortably the highest, followed by Kapil Dev, who scored 669 runs at 115.14. Klusener also averages 124 by virtue of being dismissed only three times in 11 innings.4.95 – The highest run-rate in a single World Cup tournament
The 2007 World Cup had a run-rate of 4.95, the highest among all tournaments. It is followed by the 1987 World Cup in the subcontinent, which had a run-rate of 4.87. In contrast, the 1979 World Cup produced the lowest scoring rate, of just 3.54.21 – The most centuries scored by a team in World Cups
Australia have scored 21 centuries in 69 World Cup matches, the most for any team. They are followed by India who have 15 hundreds in 58 matches.105 – The most runs conceded by a bowler in an innings in World Cups
New Zealand fast bowler Martin Snedden conceded 105 runs off his 12 overs against England in the 1983 World Cup game at The Oval, the most conceded by any bowler in a World Cup match. Asantha de Mel is next, having conceded 97 runs against West Indies at Karachi in 1987.12 – The number of batsman with 1000 or more runs in World Cups
Twelve batsmen have scored over 1000 runs in World Cups. While Sachin Tendulkar has the most runs (1796), Viv Richards has the best average (63.31) and Adam Gilchrist, the best strike rate (98.01) among these 12.42 – The most maiden overs bowled in World Cups
Glenn McGrath has bowled 42 maiden overs in 39 World Cup matches, the most by any bowler. He is followed by Chaminda Vaas and Richard Hadlee, who have bowled 39 and 38 maiden overs respectively.25 – The most catches by a fielder in World Cups
Ricky Ponting has held 25 catches in 39 World Cup matches, the most by any fielder. Sanath Jayasuriya is next, with 18 in 38 matches.19 – The number of Player of the Match awards in World Cup defeats
There have been 19 occasions when a player from the losing team has gone on to win the Player of the Match award. John Davison of Canada and Dave Houghton of Zimbabwe have each won the award on two such occasions.4 -The number of one-wicket wins in World Cups
There have been four occasions in World Cups when a team has gone on to win by one wicket. West Indies have been involved in three of the matches, winning once and losing twice.0 – The number of wins for India against Australia while chasing in World Cups
India have lost on all six occasions when they have chased against Australia in World Cups. They have twice lost by a margin of one run. Their heaviest defeat was by a margin of 162 runs in 1983.29 – Longest undefeated streak in World Cups
Australia last lost a World Cup match in the 1999 tournament, when they went down by ten runs against Pakistan. Since then, they have won 28 matches and tied one game.5 – The most run-out dismissals in a single innings in World Cup matches
There have been two occasions when five batsmen have been run out in a single innings in a World Cup match. Australia have been the team involved in both matches; the first in the 1975 World Cup final against West Indies and then against India in Mumbai in 1996.32 – The most century partnerships for a team in World Cups
Australia have had 32 century partnerships in World Cups, the most by any team. This includes ten century stands for the opening wicket, also the highest in World Cups.30 – The most sixes hit by a player in World Cups
Ponting, with 30 sixes in 36 innings, holds the record for hitting the most sixes in World Cups. He also shares the record for hitting the most sixes in an innings (8), with Adam Gilchrist and Imran Nazir.110 -The most runs in boundaries in an innings
With 17 fours and seven sixes, Sourav Ganguly scored 110 of his 183 runs in boundaries against Sri Lanka in Taunton in 1999. Richards is next, having scored 106 of his innings of 181 in boundaries, also against Sri Lanka, in the 1987 World Cup.7 – The number of ten-wicket wins in World Cups
There have been seven ten-wicket wins in World Cups, including three in the 2003 World Cup. The highest total chased without the loss of a single wicket is 221 by West Indies against Pakistan at the MCG in 1992.61.27 – The lowest strike-rate for a 100-plus score in World Cups
Gordon Greenidge’s strike rate of 61.27 in his 106 against India in 1979 is the lowest. At the other end is Matthew Hayden, who had a strike rate of 148.52 in his innings of 101 against South Africa in 2007.47.1 – The highest number of extras per match in a single tournament
The 1999 World Cup in England produced 1982 extras in 42 matches, at an average over 47 per match, which is the highest among all World Cups. In contrast, the 1979 World Cup had an average of just 25.9 extras per match.32 and 29.77 – The overall average of top-order (1-7) left-hand and right-hand batsmen in World Cups
Top-order left-hand batsmen have, on an average, performed better than right handers across the nine World Cups. Right-hand batsmen outperformed the left-handers in only two editions – the 1987 World Cup in the subcontinent and the 2007 World Cup in the West Indies.5 – The number of players to make a fifty-plus score and pick up four wickets in a World Cup match
Five players have achieved the feat of scoring over 50 and picking up four wickets in an innings in World Cup match. Of these, only Feiko Kloppenburg of Netherlands has scored a century and picked up four wickets in the same match.106.66 – The highest batting average in World Cup wins (min 10 innings batted)
Rahul Dravid’s average of 106.66 in 13 innings is the highest in World Cup wins. He is followed by Andrew Symonds, who averages 103.00 with one century and three fifties. Ganguly and Mark Waugh have the most centuries in World Cup wins (four each).15.65 – The lowest bowling average in World Cup wins (min 10 innings bowled)
Zaheer Khan has picked up 20 wickets at an average of 15.65 in World Cup wins, the best in the tournament’s history. McGrath is a close second with 68 wickets at an average of 15.73.17 – The number of semi-final and final matches won by the team batting first
Out of the 27 semi-final and final matches played in World Cups so far, 17 have been won by the team batting first. There have been nine wins for the team batting second and one tie.134 – The lowest successfully defended total in World Cups
Zimbabwe beat England by nine runs in their World Cup match in 1992 defending a score of 134, which is the lowest total successfully defended in World Cups. On the other hand, the highest target successfully chased is 313 by Sri Lanka against Zimbabwe in 1992.4 – The highest number of four-wicket hauls in World Cups
Shane Warne has picked up four wickets in an innings on four occasions, including in the semi-final and final of the 1999 World Cup. He is followed by Abdul Qadir, Muttiah Muralitharan and Wasim Akram who have three four-wicket hauls each.

Ricky Ponting talks about life after the Australia captaincy, and looks ahead to the Tests in Sri Lanka, and at India’s slide

Interview by Daniel Brettig25-Aug-2011″It’s not that I neglected my own game at all [because of the captaincy]. I was working as hard if not harder, even too hard, on my own game”•AFPOn the 1999 tour of Sri Lanka you played very well at No. 6, but you never enjoyed batting there?
It was always foreign to me, batting that far down the order. I’ve always been a top-order player, whether it was junior cricket or state cricket, I was always in the top three or four. So when I first got a crack in the Australian team it was difficult batting down there, and more difficult when you played in conditions like here or India, where you’re starting against spin the majority of the time or you’re starting against the reverse-swinging ball and things like that. But that was a good tour for me. I have a lot of good memories from that tour and the way that I played, I made a hundred in Colombo and made 90-odd in Kandy and 50-odd not out in the second innings as well.That’s when Steve [Waugh] came out and said that I was the future of Australian cricket and that sort of thing, and that really got me thinking about leadership down the track. To have that success – I hadn’t had success in India before that and didn’t have any immediately after either, in similar conditions – to come here and play Murali as I did and score a few runs was certainly great for my confidence.What elements of that success can you now pass on to the likes of Shaun Marsh and Usman Khawaja?
I’ve learned a lot over the years from playing in these types of conditions. We’re not used to playing in conditions like this in Australia, and you don’t learn the really fine aspects of playing spin in Australia. The wicket conditions [there] mean you can get away with hitting across the spin or pushing out and defending hard at the ball, because it’s so true off the surface, and you can’t do those things here. Even in one-day cricket, most of the guys in the middle order were starting against spin over here, so I, or we, have been doing a lot of work with Shaun and the younger blokes, just giving them a bit of a base on how to start against spin bowling and play spin bowling well.I think we’re more conscious around the team now with that sort of stuff than ever before. I remember, when I first came into the side no one was really willing to share information about the way they were doing it, the way they were playing. The senior players sort of let you figure it out for yourself. But we pride ourselves on sharing information and trying to help the younger guys out as much as possible, and I guess the team is in a place at the moment where we need to be doing that and teaching the guys as quickly as possible.The next tour here in 2004 was your first as captain, and while it was a 3-0 sweep, each Test match was close. A nerve-wracking start to captaincy?
Definitely it was for me, stepping into the captaincy, and we were behind on first innings in every Test match and ended up winning every Test match. That’s the way cricket is played on the subcontinent. There’s lots of exciting Test matches but everything seems to happen late in the games on the subcontinent, so you do have a lot of close finishes, when you probably think the game is going nowhere. And that is what we have to understand about this tour as well. We’ll get some very good batting wickets for the first three or four days of these games, and then all of a sudden things can change really quickly late in the game, and that’s the way it worked out in ’04. Luckily we were on the winning end in those Test matches. [It was] a great way for me to start and a great result for the boys to achieve in those conditions.

“The real cricket-loving kids? They don’t want to play T20 cricket. It’s the kids that aren’t really that good or technically that good who want to play T20 cricket”

One thing we’ll be really careful of this time around is, we won’t overplay the conditions. Quite often when we arrive in somewhere like Sri Lanka or India, we talk a lot about the wickets and how much they’re going to spin, and at the end of the day it’s a cricket pitch the same length as anywhere else you play, and the grounds you play on are quite similar as well. As long as you work out your plan as to how you want to play in the nets and the practice game, and you apply that to the best of your ability in the game, then you’ll be fine. It’s important we don’t make too much of it.From a distance your batting looks in good shape. Is that how it feels to you?
Yeah, it does. I’ve felt really good right from the start of the tour, to tell the truth. Getting off to a good start, 50 in the first game and 90-odd in the second game was a really good start for me, but it’s probably been more the way that I’ve felt, how I’ve been seeing the ball, and I haven’t had to really take too many risks. I’ve been able to score freely enough and chasing a couple of small totals in the first couple of games probably helped that as well. I was a little disappointed the way things finished off, getting 30, and the way I got out was a bit disappointing, but I feel like I’m in control. You just know within yourself if you’re batting well or not batting well, and at the moment things feel pretty good.Much has been said about the dynamic between you and Michael Clarke, now he is the captain, but what about as batsmen? At Nos. 3 and 4 you should be looking for partnerships together.
In the Test series, definitely. Through our careers, even in the dominant teams, we haven’t actually spent a lot of time together out in the middle. We had a great partnership in Hobart [against Pakistan in 2010], and we know how important we are to the team. We both probably over-emphasised that a bit too much last year, and put a little too much pressure on ourselves to be the men that were going to hold the hopes of the team up. So Michael’s been very good on this tour – Man of the Series, and the captaincy seems to be sitting really well with him. We need to score runs, but at the same time we’ve got to not worry about the pressures that come with it. I’m pretty sure that if we play the way we know we can play here, then we should be able to make some good scores together.Would you say you’re complimentary players, with styles that ask different questions of bowlers and captains?
Yeah, probably, if you look at the way we play fast bowling and spin bowling, it’s probably vastly different. Michael tends to use his feet against the spinners a bit more than I do, and we both probably play fast bowling a little bit differently as well, so if you sat back and looked at it that way, you’d think we’d be a very successful partnership together, but so far it probably hasn’t been as productive as we would have liked. Hopefully that changes in the next couple of years.As captain your own batting seemed to lose some of its authority in direct proportion to how much time and worry you had about the team you were leading.
There’s no doubt that it got harder, with the team performance, the team change, and the pressures I was putting on myself as a result of those things made batting harder. Now since I’ve stepped away, I’ve probably been more productive in the last couple of series than I had been for a while before that. And it was a big part of my thinking as well. One, I thought the timing was right to give Michael the opportunity with the right amount of time before the next Ashes series – to give him the appropriate time to get ready; but at the same time I honestly felt if I could lift a lot of the responsibility off my shoulders and the thinking that goes into picking teams and playing, that hopefully I could bring a bit of good stuff out.With Michael Clarke: “You’d think we’d be a very successful partnership together, but so far it probably hasn’t been as productive as we would’ve liked”•Getty ImagesYou took pride in how you could compartmentalise your game.
That had always been one of my strengths, being able to separate captaincy, on-field/off-field stuff and my own batting. I handled that pretty well. But more time was being taken up with the captaincy stuff, more thinking outside of what I had to do for myself as well – probably worrying more about individuals, worrying more about team performance. It’s not that I neglected my own game at all. I was working as hard if not harder, even too hard, on my own game. But the team performance was starting to play on my mind more than I wanted it to and it probably dragged my batting down a little bit. Now I’m free of that stuff and I can give advice when asked. I’ve still got a really important role around the team with developing the younger guys as quick as I can, but most importantly I’ve got to score runs that are going to be enough to win games of cricket for Australia, and that’s my main objective for the immediate future.One of the recurring events for you was the close and unfortunate run-out. One thing the run-outs all had in common was that you never dived for the crease. Never done it or considered it?
I don’t know if I ever have. Maybe I wasn’t sure if the ball was going to my end or what, but I’m not sure if I’ve ever done it. I can remember once at the Gabba doing it, but I don’t think I’d ever done it much before. A lot of the time it can depend on what foot you’re on as well – which foot you take off and whether you want to dive. I might have been able to save myself a couple of times if I had dived. The other thing, as well, with all of those is I wasn’t on strike once either.Rahul Dravid has just provided a tremendous inspiration for all batsmen of advancing years.
There are a few. Sachin [Tendulkar], [Jacques] Kallis had a great last year as well, Dravid now. It just goes to show what class can do in the game of cricket, and I’ve always said it about class players, that you never write them off, because they have just got that little bit of something extra that most blokes haven’t got. I remember after the last series in India there was a lot of talk and speculation about Dravid being finished, and I went and found him at the end of the series and said, “Don’t you even think about retiring”, because I just saw some stuff in a few of his innings that suggested he was still a very, very good player. I just said, “Don’t let them wear you down, don’t let them get you down.” I received a similar text message before and after the Ashes from him as well. So that sort of stuff is good. But it’s not only good for guys of my age to see guys doing that; it’s good for the younger blokes to see it as well, to know that if you keep doing the right things and working hard, if you’ve got talent, then age, I don’t think, is ever a barrier in our game.All those batsmen you’ve mentioned have enormous reserves of concentration, and the advance of the shorter forms has left less time for that as players develop. How can a young batsman learn the art of concentration and batting long hours if not by doing it in the middle?
You don’t. It’s as simple as that. That’s the big worry I’ve had about Twenty20 cricket, and even other shorter forms of the game being played at really developmental times in kids’ careers.Cricket for me, when I was growing up, if I was batting, it meant I was batting until someone got me out, and if that took them a week then that’s how long it took them. The guys who played in my era that’s what it was all about – not going out there and facing two overs and then being told that you had to go and stand in the field; that’s not what cricket is. And that’s the worry I have about a lot of the developmental phases. Even Under-17s and Under-19s now, they’re playing T20 games in national championships, and at the detriment of two-day games.Good state players these days are averaging 35. If you were averaging 35 when I was playing, your dad would go and buy you a basketball or a footy and tell you to play that. So there’s areas of concern there. I don’t know how you change them. Everyone we listen to says that kids want to play T20 cricket, but the real cricket-loving kids? They don’t want to play T20 cricket; it’s the kids that aren’t really that good or technically that good who want to play T20 cricket.

“One thing we’ll be really careful of this time around is, we won’t overplay the conditions. Quite often when we arrive in somewhere like Sri Lanka or India, we talk a lot about the wickets and how much they’re going to spin, and at the end of the day it’s a cricket pitch the same length as anywhere else you play”

Back in 2008 you said India were bound to have a difficult period when they started to lose their great players, as Australia had done. After the England series loss are they at that point now?
They still haven’t reached that point that I thought they’d get to yet. They’ve still got that crux, those great batters, in that side. Their bowling was obviously made to look very, very ordinary in England.The thing about India, though, is, I’m not sure exactly how many away series they won to actually get to the No. 1 Test ranking. We all know they have never travelled that well anyway. That’s why you’ve got to give England credit for what they have done. They have won pretty much everywhere they have been the last few years [England have won series in Australia, New Zealand and Bangladesh]. To get to where they are from where they were is a great result for them.Time will tell with India now. Dravid was probably one who was in the gun before the rest of them, and he’s found a way to come through. They’re all about the same age and they won’t go on forever. They will be tested more than anything with their bowlers. I think we found, even in the last few years, that a lot of their spin bowling probably isn’t as strong as it used to be, and if you take Zaheer [Khan] out of their fast bowling stocks there’s not much left there either, so they’ve got an interesting couple of years ahead.India are also a little like Australia in the extent to which they are pulled in different directions by the money on offer in T20 cricket.
They are. They’re probably prioritising it as much as anyone is, aren’t they, with the IPL being based there and the commitment some players have to certain franchises and tournaments going on around that. So I reckon a good example of where their cricket is at is the fact they played RP Singh in that last Test match, who hadn’t played a first-class game since January. While they have got the great players they have had, they’ll remain competitive, but once those guys move on it’ll be really interesting for them, and I think South Africa will be exactly the same. Once [Graeme] Smith and Kallis and [Dale] Steyn go out of that team it’ll be interesting to see how they rebuild as well.

No hundred for the hard work, and no win for India either, but a good time was had by all

Saurav Dey06-Dec-2011Choice of game
I had watched the second and third Tests of the series at the grounds, and had no plans to watch any of the ODIs, but a couple of scheduled meetings were cancelled, and I thought I could make good use of the time. So I came down to Ahmedabad from Mumbai to catch the game I expected would clinch the series for India.Key performer
Though Ravi Rampaul bowled a superb spell and Rohit Sharma showed glimpses of the greatness many expect him to achieve, Darren Sammy was my Man of the Match. Not easy to be in his shoes, since he carries the burden of possibly being the most criticised international cricketer around. When West Indies were batting, he took Abhimanyu Mithun to the cleaners in the 49th over, changing the complexion of the game completely. During the Indian chase, he ran Rohit out superbly to make up for a couple of dropped catches. The man never stops trying. Also, he kept his cool till the end and managed to get India all out, and did not panic when Rohit and Ashwin came close to the target. Good to see Sammy smiling for the right reasons at least once in the series.One thing I’d have changed
I’d have liked Rohit to get his century and take India home as he promised in an interview a few days back.Face-off I relished
Rohit v the West Indies. Sammy was sporting enough to congratulate him after his dismissal.Wow moment
When Kieron Pollard hit a Vinay Kumar delivery high, we all looked to see whether the ball would go over the rope. Then, suddenly, from nowhere came Ravindra Jadeja, hot on its trail, before lunging at the ball and taking a ripper, stunning the whole crowd into disbelief. This was followed by loud celebrations from the crowd, and all his team-mates ran towards Jadeja to congratulate him. The next moment, everyone turned towards the giant screen to see the replay, after which the crowd stood up in unison to applaud.Close encounter
Virat Kohli gets cheered everywhere he goes, and often looks a little hassled by it, but this time he waved graciously at the spectators when they chanted his name. But the one who pleased the crowd the most was Kieron Pollard – whenever the crowd cheered for him, he turned back and did a , sending the crowd into a frenzy.Shot of the day
Before the last ball of the 43rd over, it seemed like Rohit was asking Mithun to judiciously block the delivery. Mithun had other ideas, and hit it for a huge six. The crowd, who had been happy to watch him block the ball till then, went delirious and produced another standing ovation, with people calling him the “Mithun Chakraborty of cricket”.Crowd meter
The stadium was almost jam-packed. There was a constant buzz all the time, though it dimmed considerably after Jadeja’s dismissal, with India at 105 for 6. There were brisk sales of Indian flags outside, and I haven’t so many flags at a stadium, even at Eden or Wankhede.In this Indian team, it is usually Virat Kohli who gets the most cheers, but local boy Parthiv Patel was the apple of everyone’s eye today. An elderly gentleman walked in a little late, sat in my row and asked the people around: “Sachin ? Parthiv “? (Is Sachin here? Parthiv?) He asked later if Aaron and Yadav were the same or two different players.An elderly man and his grandson sitting in front of me watched the game with whole-hearted enthusiasm. Towards the end of the West Indies innings, the grandpa tried to explain to the boy that they should support Windies now so that they would score some runs and the game would become interesting. So when Andre Russell and Sammy hit boundaries, the grandpa beamed, while the grandson ( keen on the plan) sulked.Entertainment
A lady with a singsong voice announced at the beginning that India had won the toss and decided to field. During the break she announced with great seriousness that no one should make racist comments that can hurt other people’s feelings.During the break, all what we saw was one of the Indians (seemed to be Rahane) get some fielding practice. The spectators watched with great interest and applauded every time he took a good catch.Accessories
Nothing absolutely. I have enough stadium experience to know that the more things you take to a stadium in India, the more trouble you will have. As usual, the food was very badly managed, with the one stall for four gates overcrowded all the time; after an hour all it was selling was popcorn, which means most people spent much of their time without any decent food.Marks out of 10
An 8, easily. Would have been a 9, had the match gone to the last over, and maybe a 9.5 had India won with a Rohit century. It was a cracker of a match, with the Indian chase keeping our hopes alive. The last-wicket partnership between Umesh Yadav and Mithun kept us hanging on, and every run scored was celebrated with festival-like fervour.

The fact that India were rolled over twice by Australia’s second-choice pace attack suggests the failures in England were not an aberration but confirmation of a trend

Sambit Bal at the MCG29-Dec-2011For the 71 minutes that Sachin Tendulkar was at the crease this afternoon it felt like India had gone back to the dark ages: the master on a plain of his own, and the rest doing poor impersonations of Test batsmen. Australia looked like they were bowling with their great men again. The ball was wobbling a bit in the air, jagging off the seam, and the wicketkeeper was gathering most deliveries with his gloves pointing towards the sky. It felt very 1999, or 1992.And then it got even worse for India. Tendulkar attempted a cover drive and sliced the ball to gully. Including their first-innings collapse, India had lost 14 wickets for 132 runs. They were up against an Australian attack with a combined match experience of 53 Tests and a total wicket-tally of less than 200. One of their new-ball bowlers was playing his third Test, his partner was coming back from injury, and two of the three fast bowlers might not have been playing the Test had Ryan Harris and Pat Cummins been available for selection.So then, there was the truth. The world’s most prolific, most experienced and most feted batting line-up had been rolled over twice by Australia’s second-choice pace attack. They may not be second-choice bowlers for much longer, though, for they were marvellous. Only the sight of the tailenders got them to aim at the throat; otherwise, their devotion to the fundamentals of bowling was magnificently steadfast.Throughout the Test, they kept their pace up and bowled excellent lines, but the most remarkable aspect of their bowling was the length they maintained. They had heeded the advice of their bowling coach Craig McDermott – who, incredible as it may sound, bowled to Tendulkar in 1992 – to keep the ball up.It is one of the simplest principles of quick bowling. The full ball creates the opportunity for three of the most common forms of dismissal: caught, bowled and leg before. The word hostility is attached to the short ball but, though they bowled full, there was no let up in aggression from the Australia bowlers in this Test. It was just that they targeted the stumps more than the body. It resonated in the scorecard: India batsmen were bowled seven times, and, if you include the time he was bowled off a Peter Siddle no-ball, Rahul Dravid alone was bowled three times.James Pattinson was named Man of the Match but it must have been a marginal selection: there was not a lot to choose between all three. Ben Hilfenhaus got seven wickets, as many as he had managed the whole summer last year, and Siddle and Pattinson got six each. Hilfenhaus has returned with an extra yard of pace, and his swing intact. Pattinson has it all: pace, swing and seam. But it is Siddle who looks the most improved bowler.As in the case of England’s Stuart Broad, Siddle is no longer the enforcer charged with bowling the heavy ball. His menace now comes from bowling full and fast, and he has added a touch of swing to his bowling. Tendulkar looked the best batsman in the match and Siddle dismissed him in both innings, once shaping the ball in and once moving it out. In both cases Tendulkar had been drawn in to the drive by the length.Both teams came in to this series facing questions. Though they won, Australia have not found all the answers. Their top order remains a worry. Shaun Marsh failed twice, while Michael Clarke and David Warner had a start each but failed to press on. Michael Hussey, though, found his feet again, when it was most direly needed. The biggest positive was the sight of a familiar man steadying both innings. Ricky Ponting is unlikely to recapture the majesty of his youth, but in a bowlers’ Test his half-centuries could easily have won him the Man-of-the-Match award. He can now go through the rest of the series without being hounded by calls for his head.At the start of the Test, the big questions facing India pertained to their bowlers. There were fitness concerns about Zaheer Khan and Ishant Sharma, and Umesh Yadav and R Aswhin were both inexperienced. As they have done many times in the past – the summer’s England tour was an exception – the bowlers exceeded expectations. However, alarmingly, it seems the poor batting performance in England was hardly an aberration.In fact, it was merely confirmation of a pattern. Since they posted 364 in challenging conditions in Cape Town in the first Test of the year, only once have India managed to go past 300 in 16 innings away from home – and that includes six innings against West Indies. Neither of their openers has scored a hundred this year – in Gautam Gambhir’s case the drought stretches back two years. Only two of their batsmen have managed to score a hundred away from home and only Dravid has managed more than one.Some of the weaknesses in the Indian batting were glaringly apparent in Melbourne. Gambhir poked at balls he should have comfortably left alone and his long run of failures must now count as a serious worry. His uncertainty outside the off stump has always been noticeable, but the best feature of his game, his mental strength, seems to have deserted him. He now deals with the new ball with jabs and prods, and while he may get away with a few on low pitches in India, in Australia the edges are certain to carry to the cordon.There is nothing unusual about Virender Sehwag collaborating in his own dismissals, and he is certain to go flashing at the first hint of width in Sydney. But that he averages 29.53 this year, and came in to this series with scores of 13, 11, 0, 0, 8 and 33 in away matches points to a batsman without the security of runs. His 67 in the first innings here featured some blazing shots, but also two clear chances and a near miss.It has been three years since Sourav Ganguly vacated the No. 6 spot amid clamour for young blood, but that position is far from taken. Yuvraj Singh and Suresh Raina have both been tried and abandoned, and Virat Kohli finds himself facing the heat now. He was unsettled by the short ball in the West Indies, and found his defensive technique exposed in the both the innings at the MCG. He is likely to keep his place for the next Test, but only just.For the first time since 1977, India started this tour with genuine prospects of winning their first-ever Test series in Australia. The fourth day began with the rare opportunity of starting an away series with a win. In the first session, they enacted a familiar routine by failing to knock over the tailenders. The last two Australian wickets extended the target by 74 runs to ensure India began the chase as underdogs. But the most damning fact of the day was that with 30 runs, Ashwin was the second-highest scorer for India in their second innings.From here it would take a remarkable batting turnaround for India to keep the series alive. The New Year could not come any sooner.

ESPNcricinfo presents the plays of the day from the opening day in Port-of-Spain

Daniel Brettig in Port-of-Spain15-Apr-2012Recall of the dayThe sixth ball of the match, delivered by Fidel Edwards, created a veritable trove of ambiguities and intrigues. Edwards moved the ball back into David Warner, the ball flicking pad, maybe bat and perhaps even stump on its way through to Carlton Baugh. West Indies appealed for caught behind and Marais Erasmus raised his finger, but before long Darren Sammy withdrew the hosts’ appeal because Baugh had not taken the catch. Had Sammy waited until the umpires resorted to television replays he may have seen Warner depart anyway, for the vision revealing the absence of any bat also showed that batsman could have been given out lbw.Introduction of the dayShane Shillingford’s first over of the Test caused plenty of eyes to narrow in on the Port-of-Spain pitch, to see how much spin and bounce would be on offer to the slow bowlers. Australia’s best judges reckoned it worthy of twin spin, and Shillingford would back up their summation of the surface by turning the ball appreciably. Warner has not been entirely comfortable against the turning ball so far in his Test career, and when Shillingford tossed his fifth ball higher, Australia’s opening batsman walked into a drive and snicked straight to slip.Afternoon greeting of the dayThe surface continued to assist Shillingford throughout a long and exacting spell. But his most notable delivery gave Ricky Ponting a fright on his return after lunch. Second ball of the afternoon session, Shillingford pitched an off break on a good length outside off stump. It failed almost entirely to bounce, forcing Ponting to jam down desperately in defence of his stumps and his pads, the edge trickling away and leaving all batsmen on both sides with an indicator of what they may expect later on in the match.Assist of the dayKemar Roach blasted out Ed Cowan and Ponting in a swift spell opposite the parsimonious Shillingford either side of lunch. But to dismiss Ponting, Roach required the help of two team-mates in the field. A delivery angled into Ponting and moving subtly way touched the former captain’s outside edge and flew through to Baugh, on the ground where he made his debut against Australia in 2003. However Baugh was unable to take it cleanly, the ball popping out of his gloves and rebounding to Sammy to claim it before it fell to the turf. Having been run-out in the first innings in Bridgetown then bowled by a shooter in the second, Ponting’s been a little short of luck in the Caribbean and here his run continued.