Team composition poses problems for India

The South African victory in the first Test was expected. What was unexpected was a nine-wicket win with more than a day to spare.

When a team has so many factors going against them, it is imperative that nothing is done to weaken the side further. The strongest possible outfit must be played, the batsmen and bowlers must do their job in exemplary fashion, and half-chances have to be taken in the field.

There were really too many factors ranged against the Indians on the eve of the game. For one thing, there was the wide disparity in the past records. Not having won even one of the seven Tests in South Africa over the two previous visits, the Indians were at a serious psychological disadvantage. The South Africans, besides being a formidable outfit at home, were also aware that they had bearded their rivals in their own den, sweeping a two-Test series in India 20 months ago. Secondly, the visitors were badly affected by the pre-Test tour game being washed out. The right build up is all-important, and a oneday competition is hardly the right way to prepare for a Test series. Moreover, there was nothing in India's recent away record in Zimbabwe and Sri Lanka to inspire confidence.

When a team has so many factors going against them, it is imperative that nothing is done to weaken the side further. The strongest possible outfit must be played, the batsmen and bowlers must do their job in exemplary fashion, and half-chances have to be taken in the field. Then, with some luck, maybe the Test can be saved.

Unfortunately, things did not quite work out that way. True, eve-ofthe-match injuries to Sameer Dighe and Harbhajan Singh were, as the cliché goes, circumstances beyond anyone's control. But Dighe could not have done any better than Deep Dasgupta, who in fact had a fairly good match, and Harbhajan's presence would not have made much difference to the final result. So marked was the difference between the two sides in their approach that, at most, the victory margin might not have been so wide and the match might have gone to the fifth day. For, if anything, the problem lay more with the batting than the bowling.

True, the bowling was generally way off the mark. When the bowlers concede a total of 563, it does put pressure on the batsmen. Certainly the bowling quartet ­ three of whom conceded over 100 runs each and the fourth gave away 98 ­ will not remember Bloemfontein with any sense of pride or satisfaction, even though Javagal Srinath emerged with some credit. But then, what are the other options available to the team management? The attack has to have two seamers and two spinners, and this would have been the case had Harbhajan been fit. But the seam attack is so weak that Anil Kumble and Harbhajan would have to be at their absolute devastating best to do an adequate coverup job. Kumble would have to rework the Kotla magic of 1999 and Harbhajan the kind of wonders he pulled off against Australia earlier this year. Unfortunately, as everyone knows, these are once in a lifetime achievements.

And now to the batting. I wonder whose bright idea it was to ask Rahul Dravid to open the batting. He is not a guinea pig to be tested in a role in which he has already shown his distaste and in which position his record is woeful. In the past, the guinea pigs were players like Nayan Mongia and MSK Prasad ­ and even VVS Laxman before he came good in the middle order. Since when are highly successful middle-order batsmen, established players who are among the top two or three batsmen in the team, with an average of 50 plus, used for lab tests? Let us stop these foolish experiments pronto. A specialist opening batsman has been picked for the tour. Does he not deserve a chance?

A disturbing point to ponder over is that there are not many options for the team management as regards the composition of the final playing eleven. In the absence of an all-rounder, the only two choices are six batsmen and four bowlers or five batsmen and five bowlers. Both options are fraught with danger given the Indian team's inconsistency. But having gone in for the first choice and lost badly, perhaps there is no way out but to opt for the second choice, hope for the five bowlers to dismiss South Africa twice, and hope that the five batsmen avoid the mistakes they made in the first Test. Or is this hoping for too much?