Endless ODI preview

Now that the two T20s are over and India have finally managed an away win in some format we can look forward to over a month’s worth of ODIs! I hope you’re all as excited as I am about the prospect of 15 one day internationals. After all, no one got bored senseless after five of the seven match post-Ashes ODI series so the best thing to do is double that number and make sure that four of the matches will be between teams about whom the locals do not care.

Looking at the teams, I can’t see anyone other than Australia winning. Australia did not have the same dip in form in the shorter format as they have had in Test matches, and they are still difficult to beat at home. They won the short series against South Africa recently, and going back farther beat England even after being hammered in the Test series. They did not do as well in the World Cup, but will have the advantage of the conditions this time.

The more (but still not very) interesting question is who they will play in the final. India have finally broken their overseas duck, but almost anything can happen in a T20. They still have a lot of questions to be answered about their batting in foreign conditions, however, none of the problems they had in the Test series will entirely vanish in the shorter form, even if their bowling may tighten up. We saw in England that they still struggle, even against a decidedly mediocre ODI side and I expect them to struggle playing Australia.

Sri Lanka are punching above their weight right now, I’d say. Their players have not been paid properly for quite some time now, and eventually that will take a toll on even the most committed cricketer. The fact that they still managed a famous win in Durban is a massive credit to their spirit. They are another side, however, who have not been threatening outside the subcontinent, losing the ODI series in England and South Africa.

The second finalist will probably be decided by the winner of the head to head matches between India and Sri Lanka and those will be interesting, if sparsely attended. Neither side is suited to exploit the weaknesses of the other side in the conditions. I would expect Sri Lanka to win though, they have shown more fight recently and I think that will count for a lot. Ultimately, I expect Australia to beat Sri Lanka 2-0 in the finals.

What next for India?

The past few months have not been kind to India (though I’ve heard many of their fans wanted England to lose more than Pakistan, so they’ll have some consolation). It’s been clear for some time that they need to make changes and I think after their latest result they may finally do so.

They first, and relatively simple, changes are to personnel. They have some very illustrious batsmen, but they are nearing the end of their careers, if not there already. There are at least some questions to be asked about every one of the Indian top seven, though some more than others. Gautam Gambhir is one of the least well known of the Indian batmen, but he is in the eighth year of his career and averages 45. It’s certainly quite respectable, but he has not made a big score for some time now and he looked badly out of his depth in England and Australia. (He was hardly alone, of course.) He has not done very much to suggest that he be dropped, but nor has he stood out. He also has the problem common to Indian batsmen of impatience to score runs, and he does not leave balls outside his off stump well. I would probably keep him around for a bit longer, but only until the replacements are ready. With Virender Sehwag, however, I would get shot of him as soon as possible. At the very least I would never include him in a squad to play outside Asia. He has no technique and does not even come close to having the temperament for Test cricket. He is the very definition of a flat track bully, averaging 61 in Asia and a miserable 36 outside it. Worse, he is one of the most selfish players in the game. He could be one of the best batsmen in the game, but he refuses to adapt his game in difficult conditions and throws his wicket away when the team need him to perform. No where was this more apparent than in the fourth Test of this most recent series. India needed to bat for over a day to save the Test, but he kept throwing his bat at the ball. He added 62, but he runs were purely nominal. India needed a draw, and he refused to even try.

The openers, Sehwag in particular, have consistently put India in a spot of bother early in the innings, but the failing middle order is probably the most pressing concern. The three pillars of Dravid, Tendulkar and Laxman have had, at best, mixed success in England and Australia, but they are all ageing. Dravid is the oddest case. He was a class apart in England, the lone aspect of resistance. In Australia, however, he has been all at sea. He has been horribly missing straight deliveries and all of a sudden he just doesn’t seem to be seeing the ball. For a batsman of his record, especially as recently as last summer it seems harsh to suggest that it will end his career, but he isn’t going to last forever. Tendulkar is probably only out of form by his lofty standards, but at the same time he seems to have lost his touch a bit. He is batting very aggressively and is certainly making starts but is not converting them. Most of his dismissals have been the result of good bowling, but they still tend to be predictable. He does not seem to treat good bowling spells with the respect he deserves. Despite what some may say, he is not god or even Bradman and at the moment he does not seem to realise that. He has some time left in him, but I suspect he his age means will get will get worse rather than better. Laxman is the worst off of the three. He is the only one who has been quite short of runs in both series. Unfortunately for him and for India his career does look like it’s over. He hasn’t had his touch for some time now, and even if he gets it back he is old enough that it is probably not worth waiting for. Of the three, I would drop Laxman immediately. Ideally he would be encouraged to retire, but however the official announcement goes he should not play in India’s next series. Dravid and Tendulkar are more tricky. Tendulkar’s fame is such that he will certainly never be dropped, but it’s unclear if he will have the wherewithal to retire soon. There is also the matter of the ‘100th’ century to consider; as silly as the notion is they still take it seriously. I think he should go soon, however. He still has the chance to go before he is embarrassed and it would improve his legacy if he does so. Dravid is the most interesting of the three. He may have a fatal flaw in his technique, but if there is one person that India should keep to tutor young players it is Dravid. He is the only one who seems to really care about the team and the only one who has been willing to try to dig in and fight when it is needed. None of the others have shown the same type of desire or application and India need their young players to follow Dravid’s lead as opposed to the rest of them. He might benefit from moving down the order, but certainly I would keep him around for as long as is feasible.

The rest of the players are less of a concern, though Dhoni is a poor captain and Adelaide shows that India have a perfectly good replacement for him as wicket-keeper. The problem for the bowlers is their demeanour. They can get early breakthroughs, but once a partnership starts to develop their heads go down and they seem to give up. At what point in the Sydney Test Australia were 37-3, but it wasn’t long after that India seemed to be bowling for the declaration! There is no clear way to fix that problem, though Duncan Fletcher should be able to help. (And if he can’t, he shouldn’t have the job.) A different captain may also help, though the only one with the right mentality is Dravid and he is not a long term solution. For a clear demonstration of the gap in motivation one needs to look no farther than the statements made by Dhoni and Sehwag about the 8-0 combined thrashing and the statements made by Andrew Strauss after England’s horror show in Abu Dhabi. India need more commitment.

India will host England for four Tests in November and if they play the same XI there as they did in Melbourne they will struggle again. In addition to bringing in younger players, they also must find a way to bet those players experience in alien conditions. Suresh Raina was dreadfully exposed against the short ball last summer, but Kohli showed in Australia that it is possible for them to adjust. A season playing county cricket would probably do them a lot of good, though the BCCI are very unlikely to allow them to do so. At the very least they need more ‘A’ tours to places like South Africa and England. Ideally in a year they will have no more than three of their current top seven still playing; they will still have a bedding in period, but they will at least be on the right track.

Adelaide thoughts

The Adelaide Test is over, and I have not watched as much of it as I feel like I should. On the other hand, the bits that I have seen have been pretty much the same as the first three Tests, but there have been some interesting points:

– Most interesting was that Clarke did not enforce the follow-on despite having a huge first innings lead. The only reason for this I can think is that he wanted to rest his bowlers in the heat, but I think it was a bad idea. It didn’t make a difference to the result, but India did get 400 in the second innings at Sydney (their only score of note admittedly) and it seems unreasonable to jeopardise the match by scoring needless runs. It is the last Test of the home series and only Siddle played in the first five. They can (and maybe should) rest in the ODIs, but first they have a Test to win.

– After Clarke did declare, the declaration batting was fairly poor. Most notable was Haddin, who scored so slowly he provoked a seemingly outraged calling of the side in by Clarke. I understand that he is badly in need of runs, but after playing terrible shots for the better part of a year, the declaration was not the time to suddenly start scratching around. It was selfish play, and it in it’s own way was just as bad as his flashes in Cape Town and Hobart.

– It’s no surprise that Sehwag played like an idiot, but as captain some measure of restraint may have been warranted. In the second innings he was opening the batting in a nominal chase of 500, but in practise the goal would have been to bat out the draw and punish Clarke for not making them follow-on. It was a time for the captain to lead from the front and dig in. Instead he continued to throw his bat at everything, rode his luck past fifty (five aerial edges) and finally played a heave to the spinner that was an insult to the game. It was the very antithesis of a captain’s innings and whilst I’m not optimistic, there ought to be repercussions for his behaviour.

Australia win by an innings and 37 runs

The third Test is over after seven sessions, three overs and two balls. India actually played well through most of the morning. Dravid batted with more fluency and Kohli finally looked like a proper Test player. They were helped by Australia not hitting the right lines and lengths as often as they would like. There were quite a few good balls that troubled the Indian batsmen, but most were too wide of off stump. To be fair, the way India had played previously in the series suggested that they would chase wide ones, but they didn’t today. Dravid was finally undone by a full straight one that took out leg stump though and that just about ended India’s hopes. Dhoni mad eonly two and the tailenders collapsed in a heap after lunch. Kohli at least avoided being stranded short of his hundred by being the last man out for 75. It was easily the best score by an Indian batsman in either innings and there were only two better totals at Sydney.

Despite showing some relative fight in this match, the fact is that the Indian batsmen have been abject for about six months now. Their only batsman to hit a century in England or Australia is Rahul Dravid and their top seven average under 30. In 14 innings now they have gone past 300 only once and been bowled out for under 200 five times. It simply isn’t acceptable for a Test side to bat so poorly. Laxman ought not to play another Test and if current form continues Dravid may need to be shown the door before too much longer as well. Sehwag ought never to play outside India again. Gambhir has bought himself some time, but still does not look properly convincing and Tendulkar’s form is slipping away as well. There is a strong case to be made that only Virat Kohli should still be regularly playing for India in twelve month’s time. He looked much more assured this innings and his talent has started to show, but he also has a little way to go before he is a good, consistent player. I don’t think Australia tested him with short stuff enough in this innings.

India’s bowling is better, and they came out well yesterday to dismiss Australia for a reasonable total, but they are still not good enough. They have the talent, certainly, but they do not seem to be cut out for the rigours of Test cricket. They will often bowl very well for a spell, put the opposition under a bit of pressure and then give up. It was painfully clear at Sydney when Australia went from 37-3 to 600-something, but we also saw it in the second innings at Lord’s last year and to an extent at Trent Bridge as well. Duncan Fletcher must find a way to remind them that they will have to bowl at least for the better part of a day in most Tests and they are expected to make an effort throughout that time.

Australia for their part did enough. As poor as India’s batting was, part of that was because of the skill of the Australian seam quartet. Harris proved an admirable replacement for Pattinson, which was not a surprise, but what was a bit surprising was how well Mitchell Starc did as the fourth seamer. He did all right against New Zealand, but I hadn’t bee too impressed with him. Here he was helped by the conditions, as were all the bowlers, and he looked very good. He was getting a lot of swing and for the most part pitching the ball up. The ball that got Tendulkar was an excellent one, although it was not played well. It begs the question of who will miss out in Adelaide when presumably Nathan Lyon will return.

On the flat Adelaide wicket it could actually be a batsman to miss out, since they won’t be as needed. There are certainly a few candidates; after the openers put on a combined 254 the next nine only managed 110 between them and the highest score was from a bowler, Siddle. If they do decide to drop a batsman (which is a big ‘if’) it would probably be Marsh. After a good start to his Test career he has looked out of his depth in the past two series. He is probably the front runner to miss out when Watson returns. There is still the matter of Ponting and Hussey though; as well as they did in the last Test they still will not be around forever and must still always be considered when there is talk of dropping a batsman. Were I the one to make the decision though, I would play five bowlers at Adelaide with Marsh missing out for Lyon.

That said, it almost looks like it won’t matter. India have played so poorly, and been so far gone in this series that Australia could probably field their ‘A’ side and be in with a shout. India can at least look forward to Adelaide as being the end of their torment, but if they don’t make radical changes their next series won’t be any better.

Waca, day two

It’s only been two days, yet the match is almost over. Ironically India are facing a seven session defeat due to their own bowling fightback. Australia’s first wicket fell on 214 when Cowan was bowled and their last fell on 369. It was very much the sort of collapse that we are used to seeing from them recently, except this time they had a platform of over 200 runs and had already taken the game away. India bowled very well though; for the first time in this series they managed to put on a long period of sustained pressure. They bowled with good, tight lines and exploited the favourable conditions for bowling. After Australia’s openers were both gone their next highest individual total was Peter Siddle’s 30, and no one else passed 20. If India had bowled as well yesterday as they did today there would probably be a game on, but unfortunately for them all of their efforts were too late.

A large part of that was down to Warner. His batting was brilliant and was a great example of how to be attacking without chasing every ball. He did finally hole out for 180, but he survived the entire morning session in tough conditions whilst losing three partners at the other end. Unlike Sehwag he did not just root his feet to the crease and slash at everything with his arms, but actually made an effort to get to the ball before playing his shots and still left and defended when necessary. That said, the commentary about him was nauseating. He got out cheaply in his previous two innings playing the same way and he still scored 114 runs fewer than Alastair Cook did at Edgbaston. Despite what Ravi Shastri may say, there is not a new way to bat in Test matches.

After conceding a first innings lead of 208, India had to bat sensibly in tricky conditions. Instead they sent Sehwag to the crease. To be fair, he outlasted his opening partner and when he got out it was to a good delivery rather than a dreadful shot. He even made a half-hearted attempt to rein in his batting, though he still threw the bat at balls outside the off stump a few times. India slipped to 51-4 as all of the hard work their bowlers had done was thrown away. Gambhir and Sehwag both got very good deliveries, though both could have played them better. The real worry for India will be Tendulkar and Laxman though. Tendulkar did his very best Ponting impression at the crease, falling across the stumps and being trapped LBW before taking a bit to walk off and shaking his head as he did so. It was that last bit that really irritated me. (I enjoyed the first bit, since I knew I wouldn’t have to hear any talk of his next hundred.) It wasn’t a big thing and I don’t think anyone made anything of it, but especially from a batsman of his stature it is bad form. His board, some of his teammates and I think he himself have spoken up against the DRS which is fair enough, but it means that they must accept the umpire’s decision with good grace. They asked for the umpire’s decision to be final, it’s too late now to be whingeing about not getting a decision. In any case the decision to give Tendulkar out was a good one, he was struck dead in front and the ball was going on to hit leg stump.

Immediately after that Laxman stuck his bat at an outswinger from Hilfenhaus and was caught at slip. It was a decent delivery, but Laxman utterly failed to move his feet and played a Sehwag-esque poke. It’s a continuation of an absolutely dreadful run of form; in fourteen innings against England and Australia Laxman now averages 20.28 with a high score of 66. Those stats are only slightly better than those of Paul Collingwood before he retired, and Collingwood was at least playing in a side that could carry him. Laxman isn’t. In the same time as he has averaged 20, the Indian top seven have only averaged 28. He might regain his form, although he’s getting old, but India don’t have the batting around him to carry him until he does. With the Adelaide Test certain to be a dead rubber, India will not have a better opportunity to replace him with a younger batsman. If they are serious about improving as a Test side, Laxman has to have played his last match.

Australia will probably be happy with how the day went, although they lost two of three sessions. They are in a position where they will have a very good chance to win the match before lunch tomorrow and will have two days off and a 3-0 lead. India fought well; the bowlers avoided embarrassment and Dravid and Kohli put on enough of a partnership to avoid losing inside two days, but they were so poor on the first day and in the first two Tests that it is far too late to help them. We saw it in the England series too, when they finally remembered how to bat only after being asked to follow-on at the Oval. One can’t win a four Test series by only playing well in two sessions and until they learn to show up when it matters they will continue to be humiliated.

Why Australia will win at Perth

India’s batsmen are not going to stop struggling overnight, or even over the week they’ve had between Tests. Gambhir may come back into form (but there is no guarantee), but Sehwag does not have the technique to score big runs on a pitch like in Perth, or for that matter anyplace where the ball does not lose all it’s pace off the pitch. Dravid, after batting so brilliantly in England, suddenly has a massive weakness against the straight ball. For someone of his experience to suddenly be unable to keep the ball off his stumps does not bode well. Tendulkar is making decent scores, but he is getting out lazily when he is well set. Whether it’s because he’s bought into the ‘hundredth hundred’ nonsense and is feeling the pressure from that or not he has been attacking with an almost Sehwag-esque abandon in the first two Tests. It hasn’t paid off and probably won’t pay off. VVS Laxman looks like his career is coming rapidly to a close. He had a poor series in England and now he’s having a poor one here. On more than one occasion in the two series he has got out trying to flick the ball off his hip and failing to keep it down. With the extra pace at the WACA, I wold not be surprised if that happens again. Neither Raina nor Kohli appear to be able to play a short ball. They’ve both come in having only played the longer forms of the game on the flat wickets of India and now they are out of their depth. It’s not really their fault, but India should have prepared them better or found batsmen who could handle the conditions. Dhoni is in dreadful form with the bat, only managing a few counterattacking rearguards after the top six have collapsed. He could still come around and play a big innings though.

Overall these are not minor problems, nor are they down to the simple dips in form that occasionally afflict all batsmen. Some of the batsmen may be able to carry on, but I think at least four of them will not be playing in 12 month’s time. Sehwag is unlikely to ever be a force outside the subcontinent. I can’t see them putting up a big total. This will have a knock-on effect, even if they bowl first. India’s attack is theoretically skilled enough to bowl out Australia cheaply, but as we saw at Trent Bridge last summer, that is only half of the job. It won’t matter how well the bowlers do if the batsmen can’t back them up with some runs and I don’t see that happening. India have not shown very much fight in any of the previous six Tests against England and Australia; their body language has been very negative when they’ve been under the cosh. At no point since Broad’s hat-trick have they really looked up for it and I think that will haunt them in this match. At the SCG they let Australia get away from being 37-3 and if they collapse again I doubt they will be able to rouse themselves in the field. Australia are poor enough that they could give India a chance in the match, but India are so out of form and so uninspired that I can’t see them taking it.

Australia win by an innings and 68 runs

It was actually a lot closer than I thought it would be. India batted very well in the morning session, only losing Gambhir, and scoring at a frenetic rate. There always seems to be the looming spectre of a collapse about India’s batting, however, regardless of how assured any two of them may look during a partnership. Today the collapse was started in possibly the most ridiculous manner possible, when Michael Clarke brought himself onto bowl in an effort to get through the last few overs before the new ball quickly and ended up getting Sachin Tendulkar caught at slip via a dreadful drop by Haddin. It was just about as farcical as one could imagine, but it meant that a new batsman, Kohli, would come in to face the new ball. Just before Tendulkar was out the score was 271-3. Seven overs later the score was 286-7. The surprising bit for me was that India’s tail did not carry on in the same manner, to which I have become accustomed. The tail wagged quite a lot, with Ashwin scoring 62 and Zaheer Khan a rapid-fire 35. There was a point at which another sub-300 score looked quite likely, but the lower order did manage to save some face for India.

The result leaves the question of where the two sides, especially India, go from here. The series is effectively over, so India could take this opportunity to experiment with some younger batsmen. Sehwag and Laxman in particular look like they could use some time to reassess their technique, so leaving them out on one of the quicker tracks in the world, Perth, may not be a bad strategy. It is very important that they start to blood some youngsters in unfamiliar conditions. Raina in England and Kohli in Oz have been badly exposed in conditions more suited to bowlers than the ones to which they are used and they and Rohit Sharma will need to find ways to overcome that. Better for India to give them a go when there is little to lose than at the beginning of an important tour as they did in England and Australia. I don’t think it will happen, given the selectors previous tactic of burying their heads in the sand, but it would be worth a go. It could hardly be any worse, certainly.

Australia are also faced with some selection headaches. In the short term Harris is back fit and whilst he does not necessarily demand inclusion, he has been one of their best bowlers recently. Last winter Australia played an all pace attack at Perth to very good effect and I don’t think it would be a bad idea to do so again. I think Lyon is a good bowler with a lot of potential, but he hasn’t done a lot in the first two matches and the WACA will probably not suit him. In the long term they have the problem that only the old guard scored runs in this match. Warner, Cowan and Marsh all failed as they did in the second innings at the MCG. Australia cannot rely on Ponting and Hussey for very much longer, but now they are in a position where they cannot easily drop them either. If the selectors are lucky Ponting will choose the end of the Australian summer as an opportunity to retire on a high, but this does not look likely as two months ago he suggested that he might still play in the 2013 Ashes. Meanwhile Hussey seems to be making scores at the exact right time to keep his place in the side. I think that as well as Ponting and Hussey have done in this Test the selectors must still show them the door quite soon. England dropped Steve Harmison after the 2009 Ashes despite the fact that he had a good Test because Strauss and Flower recognised that he did not fit into the long term plans for the side. Australia must do the same. Fortunately for them they will at least have some time in which to consider the matter.

599-2

Yesterday was not kind to subcontinental teams. India and Sri Lanka bowled almost five sessions between them and in that time took only two wickets whilst conceding 599 runs. I can’t say much about Sri Lanka’s bowling; I didn’t see a lot of it as I have to sleep at some point and by the time I got up South Africa had declared. India’s bowling, however, was abject. They were still very much in the game at the start of the day and a couple of early wickets could have touched off another Australian collapse. They never really tried, however. At no point in the morning did they look like taking a wicket, or even like they wanted to. Dhoni was neither attacking nor trying to dry up the scoring and by the time Australia overhauled India’s first innings total it looked for all the world like declaration bowling.

I was harsh on India after the MCG Test, but they were so much worse yesterday. In Melbourne their batting let them down, but their bowling was at least average. Today it was far, far from average. They were completely flat and uninspired from the moment they got on the pitch yesterday morning. It was probably the worst bowling display I’ve seen since Australia conceded 517-1 last winter, and they at least have the excuse that England’s batsmen are very good. India picked up one wicket, that of Ponting, with the second new ball and did at least make Clarke look uncomfortable for a few overs. It wasn’t nearly enough, however, and Sehwag came on to bowl (in tandem with Ashwin) with the new ball just 18 overs old. It was an utterly pathetic effort all around and they are effectively out of the series now.

Sehwag is not an opener

In my 2011 XI post I remarked upon the fact that there were a dearth of good openers last year. Not only did no full time occupant of the position came close to matching the record of Alastair Cook, but none of them even averaged over fifty. I put it down at first to a statistical anomaly, but watching India ‘bat’ at the SCG I realised that many teams no longer have traditional openers in the mould of Strauss and Cook. Most teams now have at least one opener who tries to get his team off to an ODI-style flier. Sehwag for India is the most notable, but New Zealand have McCullum, Sri Lanka have Dilshan, Bangladesh have Iqbal, Pakistan have Hafeez, South Africa have Smith and Australia have Warner (now) and Watson (prior to his injury). The only team besides England who do not follow this trend are the West Indies, and in their case it is only because of the ongoing feud between the WICB and Chris Gayle.

I think this is central to the spate of collapses and low scores we have seen in Test matches this year. Having an ‘explosive’ batsman at the top of the order is not necessary at Test level and more and more it appears to be a hindrance. New ball bowlers have started to appreciably swing the ball again and especially last year we saw an increase in the number of wickets that helped the bowlers early on. The batsmen trying to hit out and score 100 before lunch are having their technique exposed by the moving ball and are departing early on in the innings. This is borne out by the statistics; through the noughties the average opening partnership was just a shade over 40. In 2011 it was 31.30. Having the number three come in to face a still new ball is obviously far less than ideal, and this is how top order collapses start. We’ve seen it several times this year, and whilst it isn’t all down to the failures of opening batsmen I think that is one of the main culprits. The job of an opening batsmen is to accumulate runs whilst playing the shine off the ball and wearing down the opposition’s best bowlers, not to propel the team to 150-1 at lunch. The teams like England that remember this fact are the ones that will be successful.

SCG, day one

Writing this, I was a bit tempted to reuse one of my posts from the Melbourne Test match. Once again India’s batsmen self-destructed on a pitch that was only a little bit helpful to the bowlers. None of the top order got a really unplayable ball, though Gambhir and Kohli did at least get testing ones. Even then, however, they were guilty of playing too far forward at balls that would have carried over the stumps. Dravid is now starting to look seriously weak against balls pitched up at middle stump, he was bowled twice in the last Test and today he could only get the inside edge of his bat onto one and was caught bat-pad. All the rest of the top order batsman played without footwork at balls wide of off stump and got themselves out. They ought to have learnt better in England, but having failed to do so it is not surprising (although still disappointing) that they did not learn anything at the MCG either. These are supposed to be some of the best batsmen in the world, but a county batsman would have been embarrassed by this effort. Dhoni finished 57 not out, seemingly in an effort to show the rest of them how to play and single-handedly validate the decision to bat first. I had said before the match that I thought it was a bowl first pitch, and I think I was right about that, but once again India are under pressure and have only themselves to blame.

For their part Australia did well enough, but no more. In the first half of the day especially, their line was a bit loose and Ponting dropped an absolute sitter from Sehwag. Whilst their quicks have been very good this winter, they’ll be flattered by their figures today; I expect they’d have conceded at least 350 against a good batting lineup. Their top order also failed; Warner, Cowan and Marsh made just 24 runs between them. There was at least an element of good bowling to those dismissals, however, as Zaheer Khan made the ball move both ways. Marsh should not have played at the ball he did (and looked a bit out of his depth in the one ball he faced) but appeared to be trying to cover his stumps for the inswinger, which is not ridiculous. Unfortunately for him he read the delivery wrong and edged an outswinger to slip. Ponting and Clarke then put on a good partnership, although Clarke tried really hard to get out to a Sehwag-esque shot whilst still in single figures. It will be especially frustrating for India, as they dragged themselves back into the match with the three early wickets before Ponting and Clarke got into stride and took it away again. They can’t really rue any poor fortune though. Their bowlers display the same lack of application and general unwillingness to play a full Test innings as their batsmen. Dravid and Dhoni frequently look like the only players who actually want to win the Test match. For India to succeed they must either convince Sehwag, Laxman et al to play to their fullest extent or drop them. It’s a decision they ought to make as soon as this series ends.

Australia finished on 116-3, trailing by 75 runs and are well on top. If they can push on even just to 300 tomorrow India will probably be out of both the match and the series.