How India had Aussies on the run

Test cricket is on the upswing again, not just in popularity stakes but also in the way runs are scored. More importantly, the change has hit closer home.

For India, tactically, Test matches had remained virtually stagnant. But a change slowly came in after John Wright took over as coach, and the results are there for all to see. Most importantly, India realised that to win abroad they need to try something different.

India scored at a breezy 3.48 runs an over in the recently concluded Test series against Australia. When compared with the team's scoring rate over the past decade, it reveals a lot.

Throughout the 1990s, India scored at an average of 2.95 runs an over. Since 2000, this rate had increased by a marginal 0.04 runs per over. So a jump of almost 0.5 runs per over indicated that the team was doing all it could to beat the Aussies at their own game.

Australia made the charge and dominated for a few years like no other team in history. During the 1990s, the men from Down Under also used to score at 2.95 runs an over. But as the new millennium began, they jumped by almost 1 point to 3.85 runs per over, way ahead of all other teams.

The others had their modest increases, but Australia simply moved up a couple of gears, and so quickly that the others were left far behind.

A shift in attitudes was desperately needed if the world champions were to be caught and Virender Sehwag, more than anyone else, brought it to the Indian team. His fearless approach at the start of the innings immediately had the Aussies on the back foot and they found it hard to recover after his onslaughts.

During the series, Sehwag had a strike rate of 79.31 runs per 100 balls, higher than anyone on both sides. To add to that, he scored runs (464 in the series at an average of 58.00) by the bucketful.

Akash Chopra, his opening partner, had a strike rate of 34.50, the lowest among the specialist batsmen in both teams, but was still a success because of his ability to keep one end going even as the others chanced their arms. Other than Chopra, not one of the top-order batsmen on either side had a strike rate below 50!

Together, Chopra and Sehwag, along with the other batsmen who followed, were instrumental in reviving India's status as a competitive Test-playing team. So much so that if the productivity of your office staff fell in recent weeks, chances are that Test cricket is to blame.

Time was when the limited overs version ruled the roost. But it has now become so much a batsman-dominated game that it tends to be boring as compared to Test cricket, where bowlers have the chance to try their variations and the margin for error is a little greater.

India's strong challenge to Australia has been an elixir. Instead of dominating the matches and finishing them in four days, if not three, Australia were forced to scrap it out in the middle, not always successfully.

Now, more sides will be looking to the adventure of scoring runs at a quicker pace to try and challenge Australia at the top of the world order. India have shown the way. It is up to the others to follow.