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DEAR REDIFF

India clinch thriller to make it four in a row

Prem Panicker

Winning, most cricketers I've spoken to agree, can be addictive. Habit forming.

It can also, in tight situations, make all the difference to the result - and game four of the Sahara Cup is a classic example. Thus far this year, India has on several occasions found itself chasing stiff targets. Done well in the early and middle overs. And when it came to the death, when the result depended as much on nerve as on cricketing skills, India was found wanting - as witness the plethora of dramatic collapses from potentially winning situations.

India found itself in a similar situation again, this Saturday, in the fourth game of the Sahara Cup - a tough ask and, right to the very end, a six-plus run-to-ball equation of the kind that, in earlier games this year, had seen the batsmen get out to ungainly heaves and hoiks. This time round, India was going into the game with three good wins under its belt - and the difference showed as the nerve held, the batsmen stayed focussed, and guided the side home with a total absence of fuss and panic.

In the event, India took a 4-0 lead with a thumping seven wicket win in a rain-reduced game - and in the process, gave the horse laugh to all that talk going around about how the result of the Sahara Cup had been pre-fixed (by bookies, who else?) to give India a 3-2 win.

Here are the details.

First up, heavy overnight rains ensured that despite the high quality of the covers, the outfield was far too marshy for the umpires to risk play till 2.30 in the afternoon, Canada time. And in this decision they had the full consent of the rival captains, both of whom felt rightly enough that with the series already decided, there was no sense in risking injury to players in slushy underfoot conditions - more so given the fact that after Toronto, the same two teams will take each other on in the three game Jinnah Cup in Pakistan.

In the event, what we got, on a pitch with life and movement thanks to the moisture seeping into it, and also due to chill, windy, cloudy atmospheric conditions, was cricket's equivalent of a lottery - namely, a 28-overs-a-side game.

The two teams made a change apiece to their lineups - Pakistan opting to rest a batsman, Hasan Raza, in favour of a bowler, Shahid Nazir; and India going the other way, resting Nilesh Kulkarni in favour of the extra batsman, Vinod Kambli.

Tendulkar got the call right and promptly elected to field - a good decision, seeking to take advantage of early life in the pitch. Also, given that India was going in with a stronger batting lineup, this meant that it would have an advantage, batting second, in knowing just how much it had to get.

At the outset, Saeed Anwar - who after a shaky start to the tournament appears to be running back into sublime touch here - threatened to take the game away with an electrifying innings of 30 off 30 balls, with three fours and two huge sixes, relying on his two strong areas, the flick off the pads and the driving through point and covers, to get most of the runs. The Indian bowlers for their part erred fractionally by giving him just that extra room to swing his arms, bowling short and wide of the stumps often enough to allow Anwar the luxury of stroke-making sans pressure.

Afridi, in all this time, was pretty much a passenger, standing at the non-striker's end for the most part and watching Anwar in flow. When he finally got the strike, Mohanty drew him into the drive with a lovely leg-cutter pitching just that shade short and leaving the batsman late, to take the edge for Karim to hold with comfort, Pakistan 31/1 and Afridi gone for two off two balls.

Pakistan raced to 40 off just five overs but shortly thereafter, Kuruvilla produced a peach of a delivery, almost the mirror image to one Mohanty had produced earlier in the tournament, to castle Anwar. The ball was angled across, on line of just around off stump, straightening late to go through Anwar's attempted glide behind point and peg back off stump, Pakistan 46/2 and Anwar gone for 30 off 30 with three fours and two sixes.

Anwar's departure checked the scoring rate, and Pakistan managed just 24 in the second five over segment, going to 64/2 at the end of ten overs. It was, though, still a fair old clip to be going at and if the Pakistan batsmen had concentrated on working the singles and keeping the score ticking along, the pressure especially in a reduced overs game would have swung right back to the bowling side. In the event, though, the batsmen appeared more intent in swinging for the lines, and this in turn led to mistakes. Harvinder Singh - who in these last two games has bowled with far more discipline than in his first couple of outings - produced a good awayswinger pitched on off stump, Ijaz in attempting to swing it over midwicket got hopelessly squared up, the ball taking the outer edge and flying to point for Jadeja to hold well, diving to his left, Ijaz gone for 15 off 19 with one six, Pakistan 72/3.

At the end of 15 overs, Pakistan were 90/3 and for me, the key to the game lay right there - the batting side, already one batsman short, was losing too many wickets too early and, at this point, were reduced to just Malik, Ramiz and the off form Moin Khan to get runs in the remaining 13 overs. Given a platform of 90/3 in 15, though, a score of around 175, 180 should have been on the cards - if Pakistan didn't get there, the credit goes to Saurav Ganguly and Robin Singh, who produced a dream spell in the middle overs, with Ganguly, in particular, coming up with a spell of 4-2-4-2 before going for 25 off his last two. With Robin keeping things very tight at the other end, Pakistan managed a mere 12 runs between 15-20, and a futher 21 between 20-25.

That kind of thing puts enormous pressure on the batting side and pressure, in turn, produces mistakes. Ramiz Raja (20 off 40) attempted to glide Ganguly down to third man, not making allowance for the fact that Ganguly gets very late movement off the seam - the ball deviated late, took the edge, and Karim did the rest to reduce Pakistan to 95/4.

Salim Malik looked in sublime touch when the medium pacers were on, but Ganguly appears to have some kind of hex on the Pakistan veteran. Three times in this series, Malik had fallen to Ganguly - and here they made it four in a row, when the bowler again held back an incutter, Malik flicked at it a fraction too early, and spooned it straight to Robin Singh at midwicket, Pakistan 107/5 and Malik gone for 17 off 27.

Moin Khan is a dangerous late order player, rather in the Ajay Jadeja mould. And here, just when Pakistan needed it most, he rediscovered his touch while, at the other end, Azhar Mahmood went for everything the bowlers through at him and, as often happens when you hit through the line with power turned to the max, found the boundaries with astonishing rapidity. Thus, the last three overs produced 36 runs, Moin coming up with a neat little cameo of 23 off 27 with two fours and a six before miscuing an attempted hoik over midwicket to find Tendulkar in the way off the penultimate ball of the innings, while Mahmood did his side proud with a blazing innings of 33 off 24 with three fours and two sixes, in course of which he ruined Ganguly's figures to the tune of 25 runs off two overs.

Pakistan in the event closed at 159/6 in the allotted 28 overs. And if the total wasn't higher given the kind of start Anwar had given them, credit goes to the five Indian bowlers used, all of whom kept their cool, concentrated on bowling wicket to wicket, and kept the pressure on the batting side. Kuruvilla with 6-0-29-1, Harvinder with 5-0-25-2 and Robin with 6-0-33-0 were all tidy; Mohanty, whose one wicket in five overs cost 35 runs, a shade more expensive partly because of his more aggressive, as opposed to containing, style of bowling and partly thanks to Anwar's outstanding strokeplay. And Ganguly, again, starred with a spell of 6-0-29-2, bowling right through the death and not only taking out two key batsmen, but making run-scoring far more difficult than his innocuous bowling style would suggest.

For India, the key lay in the fact that they would, by virtue of not having completed the overs in time, get two overs less to get to the target. That would have been a severe handicap except for one extenuating circumstance - the general waywardness of the Pakistan bowlers who, throughout this tournament, had been pretty prodigal with their wides. (Over 100 wides have already been sent down in this tournament and, in the final analysis, the 13 sent down by the Pak bowlers in this game played a key role in the Indian win - not only giving the batting side that many free runs, but also negating the disadvantage of losing two overs).

Tendulkar and Ganguly opened the batting for India and the former, after a lovely cover driven four followed by a flick through midwicket for two, attempted to glide Shahid Nazir down to third man and ended up edging to the keeper, India 8/1 and Tendulkar going for 6 off 7 with one four.

Robin Singh, quite rightly, came out at first wicket down - and here, his role was obviously that of pinch-hitter, given the depth in the batting lineup. Robin is a team player if ever there is one - and here, he did what he had to do, not putting too much of a premium on his wicket, preferring instead to hit through the line, to come up with a neat cameo of 16 off 18 with three fours before he pulled at one from Shahid Nazir not quite short enough for the stroke, to top edge to Mohammad Akram at third man, India 41/2.

In terms of the run rate, however, India was well in touch with the required ask, getting 33/1 in 5 and going on to 67/2 in 10. Azharuddin, coming in at two down, played one of his trademark flicks through midwicket for four and looked, yet again, in great touch before he aimed a drive to a short one from Nazir outside off, the extra bounce ensuring that the ball, though hit clean, went like a rocket straight to Ijaz Ahmed at point. Ijaz in fact needed a numbing spray on his palm after taking the catch, but in the event, India were 54/3 and, at that point, the game could have swung either way.

If it went the way of India, Ajay Jadeja and Saurav Ganguly take all the credit. While the former revelled in his silken driving through off each time the Pakistan bowlers gave him room in that region (of his eight fours, six came in the region between point and extra cover), Jadeja contendedly played second fiddle, working the ball around, running briskly and ensuring that the scoreboard never stayed static.

The interesting thing about the partnership was that it never flagged, never let the required rate climb too steeply. Thus, India were 119/3 in 20 overs, needing 41 in the last six overs (36 deliveries). It was the kind of situation where, too often in the past, the side had tended to panic, throw the bat at everything, and ended up losing too many wickets for too few runs. Here, the change was very visible - when the normally calm Jadeja swung wildly at Azhar Mahmood twice on the trot, a visibly annoyed Ganguly marched down the pitch and angrily admonished his vice captain, obviously telling him to keep his head. And a while later, when Ganguly rather needlessly attempted to give Aqib Javed the charge, it was Jadeja's turn to go down the track and advice caution.

India needed 14 runs off the last twelve deliveries - and with Saqlain bowling the penultimate over, the game was still poised in no-man's land. The very first ball of the 25th over, however, settled the issue - Ganguly coming down the track and lifting clean and hard towards long on where the tall Mohammad Akram was poised on the line. Akram had to backpeddle to hold the ball over his head - but in doing that, he took that one step too far to try and reach a ball that would have eluded a shorter fielder, overstepped the line and gave away the six. That one stroke reduced the ask to 8 off 11, and the two batsmen coasted through, Jadeja flicking a four to backward square off the third ball of the last over to give India an emphatic seven wicket win and an even more emphatic 4-0 series lead, with Jadeja (38 off 48 with three fours) and Ganguly (75 off 75 with eight fours and a six) putting together a match winning partnership of 105 runs for the fourth wicket.

For Pakistan, the usually reliable Javed for once failed to click, going for 35 off just 4.3 thanks mainly to the fact that Ganguly kept milking him through the off. Saqlain was his usual impeccable self, bowling his 5 overs for 31 runs - but I reckon Ramiz Raja got his sums wrong when he brought Saqlain on too late - it meant that the star offie bowled one less than his quota of 6 overs. Shahid Nazir was easily the pick of the bowlers, his 6 overs of top quality seam and swing bowling producing all the three Indian wickets to have fallen, for 38 runs. Akram with 5-0-27-0 and Azhar Mahmood with 5-0-25-0 were good in support - but again, the Pak medium pacers erred on the side of line, bowling far too many wide deliveries and, as a result, letting India off the hook they were on when the match referee decreed they would get two overs less to do their thing.

Ganguly, yet again, got the man of the match (his third in the series) - and fulsome praise from the adjudicator, Sir Garfield Sobers. But the bigger gain was that for the first time, he not only produced his brand of strokeplay at the start of the innings, but more to the point, stayed out there and finished off what he had begun. Too often, he has produced good innings only to succumb to mental fatigue just when it looked like he would play the match-winning innings - here, he stayed strong and focussed till the end, and that kind of experience always does a developing player good.

The other interesting aspect of the win was that India, chasing a tough ask, did it - and handily, too - without any contribution from the skipper. Too often, conventional wisdom has held that a tough chase is possible only when Tendulkar fires - this particular performance not only negates that 'wisdom', but should also now give Tendulkar the confidence that the Indian batting is not a one man show. And that, in turn, should reduce the pressure on him, and allow him to play freer than he has been doing in the recent past.

Interesting what a win can do, isn't it? Suddenly the Indian bowlers are on line and length, the fielders seem to be everywhere at once, there are spontaneous celebrations at the fall of each wicket, and more importantly, the smiles are back on everyone's faces.

So is the humour. Vide Sachin Tendulkar who, when asked in the post-match press briefing what had made the difference, said "Ganguly - this time, he proved that he can bat a bit, as well", a quip that drew a burst of laughter from the left-handed opener.

More than the talents it has unearthed in the recent past - vide Ganguly, Dravid, Mohanty et al - it is this rediscovered spirit that, properly harnessed, could help the team wipe out the nightmares of the past.

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