India runs itself out against Proteas

Did someone say the Indian team of late is two openers and a tail?

Give that guy a Nobel Prize for literature -- that one sentence is worth all the reams of analysis anyone can write.

At one game apiece in the series thus far, both teams, at the selection phase, seemed in no mood to take chances to score points off each other -- South Africa, thus, brought back Andre Nel to bolster the bowling, though the continued absence through injury of Gary Kirsten was a bit of a setback. India for its part brought back all four players -- Srinath, Agarkar, SS Das, Virendra Sehwag -- it had benched against Kenya.

The curator at Buffalo Park, East London, produced a bit of a mixed bag with the pitch -- some pace, some bounce, some cracks, but all told, a nice batting track with the ball, except when it hit one of the cracks, coming on quite nicely. And the Proteas, winning the toss, took advantage with an almost perfectly paced innings that saw them pile up 282/4 in the allotted 50 overs.

Why "almost perfectly"? Because when you have a side that bats as deep as the Proteas do and you find they've lost only 4 wickets, you wonder if maybe they could have timed their slog a tad earlier, and put up maybe another 20, 25 runs at the least albeit for the loss of three or four more wickets.

Srinath and Agarkar bowled fairly decent first overs -- and then Herschelle Gibbs took over. The opener knows only one way to go -- and that is all guns blazing. There is, about his strokeplay, a touch of the eccentric genius, and more than a smattering of arrogance, of contempt. And it was all on view today -- the genius, in the way he on one occasion, took a half pace back to shorten the length just a fraction, and with his front foot still leading, smacked a blinding pull off a ball most batsmen would have been content to work off middle stump for a single. And the contempt, equally so in the way he ignored all considerations of length and line, not to mention a few rules of batsmanship, and hit the ball exactly where he wanted to.

At the other end, Boeta Dipenaar stood and watched the fun, as Gibbs powered his side to 50 off just 37 balls, his own contribution being 37 of those.

One of these days, Gibbs will bat some 30, 40 overs -- and there's no telling what the score will be if he does that. But yet again, the flamboyant opener managed to get himself out -- a fullish length ball from Agarkar saw him aim a bored slog, trying to fetch the ball from outside off to leg, only to find Sehwag at midwicket.

Nicky Boje came in at number three to keep the momentum going (speaking of which, wasn't that Lance Klusener's role not so long ago?). And lived somewhat dangerously -- but not for long, as Dipenaar played one to midwicket, called Boje over for the run, then left him stranded as Ganguly fielded and relayed the throw to the non-striker's end.

From then on, it was the steady, skillful, but unspectacular play of Jacques Kallis and Dipenaar, in a 103-run third wicket partnership that saw both batsmen put a premium on working the ball around and running like it was going out of style (at which point, it needs mentioning that on the day, India's ground fielding was about as bad as you've ever seen it in contemporary times). It was rock solid batting -- and another of its characteristics was a willingness to play the waiting game when Harbhajan Singh and, later, Yuvraj Singh, came to the bowling crease.

It's probably between the 30th and 40th overs that South Africa lost the plot somewhat. At 30, the Proteas were 162/2. The next ten overs produced a mere 34 runs -- and while Harbhajan Singh was in one of his moods where he looks almost unplayable, the two batsmen missed a bet in letting Yuvraj settle to a nice line and rhythm without ever looking to take him on.

Kallis managed to get himself out in bizarre fashion in the 40th over when Srinath, brought back into the attack, bowled a shocking loosener, landing halfway down the pitch and angling to about two feet outside leg stump at slow pace. Kallis lunged for the ball, one handed, and clinically patted it to midwicket.

Srinath, and the pitch, combined in the next dismissal when Dipenaar aimed a shot at a delivery that, after landing back of a length, refused to climb, taking the batsman on the knee roll bang in front of the stumps.

Jonty Rhodes and Lance Klusener then got together. And played the first five overs of the slog in somewhat circumspect fashion, adding 34 in that period before Klusener really got off the blocks with strokes characterised by equal amounts of self belief, and enormous power. Rhodes, who had done the bulk of the hitting in the earlier phase, kept him company as the pair added 54 runs off the last five overs of the innings.

For India, the frontline seamers both took enormous stick -- Agarkar and Srinath first suffering at the hands of Gibbs, then courtesy Klusener at the death. Kumble was handled with ease, as was Sehwag, and it was left to Harbhajan and Yuvraj to pull things back for the Indians.

To win, India had to score more than any team had managed at this venue till date, the previous highest being 257/5 by Sri Lanka against New Zealand. More to the point, the two Indian openers had to bat out of their skins.

They did.

Ganguly provided the initial aggression, taking an early four off Shaun Pollock. Then Andre Nel, in a display of temper that made you curious to see how the match referee will react, spat some language at the Indian captain -- and Sachin Tendulkar stepped up to the plate to take the quick bowler apart with some trademark square drives and off-to-leg flicks. Ganguly meanwhile turned his attention back to Pollock, hitting him in identical fashion for sixes in successive overs -- on each occasion, coming down the track a pace, playing just enough inside out to get room for the hit high over long off.

There was an interesting tactical battle in there -- in the previous encounter, Ganguly had on two occasions stepped away to leg to make room, using the shorter length bowled by Pollock to get under the ball and lift over point. This time, Pollock countered by bowling fuller -- and Ganguly's riposte was to hit straight.

India raced to 57/0 in 10 overs and when Nel and Pollock went off after their mandatory six-over spells, the former had gone for 38, the latter for 35 and India after 12 were 73/0.

From there on, the shots and landmarks kept coming. Ganguly, by now in complete command and getting the bulk of the strike to boot, got to yet another ODI fifty, off 56 deliveries, with three fours and three huge sixes -- the third being an amazing shot, stepping to off to a Nel short-pitched delivery, letting it climb and then flicking it over deep backward square.

India got to 99/0 at the end of 15 overs (the 15th, by Ntini, producing 16 runs including yet another Ganguly six preceeded by a slashing four) and off the first ball of the next over, the partnership reached 100 off 94 deliveries -- in the process, equalling the record of 15 century opening partnerships by Desmond Haynes and Gordon Greenidge.

A danger signal, though, was apparent by then. Sachin had -- for the first time this series -- been hitting his two favourite shots, the punched drives on the up on the off side, and the flicks from off and outside off to square leg and behind -- right from ball one. And when that happens, and he finds himself at the wrong end for a spell, impatience more often than not set in.

Here, he had less reason than usual for impatience, since Ganguly was batting like a dream. But that weakness of the opener showed, as he aimed a pull at a Kallis delivery too full for the shot, managing only to under edge it onto his leg stump (37 off 34).

Shiv Sundar Das came in at one drop and left immediately. This time, to a run out. Das in fact played the shot well, angling his bat to run a short lifting delivery down behind point. Ganguly called for the second, seeing Andre Nel slip a bit. The tall fast bowler, though, recovered brilliantly to send back a perfect throw while still off balance, to find the batsman way off base.

Rahul Dravid came in at 4. And for the second time in the innings, you wondered whether the Indians were missing a bet, not letting Sehwag come out against the harder ball and keep the momentum going, in the process taking a bit of the pressure off Ganguly.

In the event, the run rate slowed to a seeming standstill. And Ganguly, in a bid to try and take a bit of the pressure off, went for the big hit against Nicky Boje, and paid. The Indian skipper got a bit too close to the ball as he danced down, and thus failed to find the room he needed on his attempted lofted on drive. Kallis, poised right on the line for the shot, judged to a nicety and held, and India's chances for all practical purposes were botched.

At 161/3 at the end of 30 overs, India was well in the game -- on paper, that is. The trouble is, though, that India's middle order has rarely delivered in the middle what it has promised on paper. And that story was repeated again here. Yuvraj Singh seemed petrified by Klusener's rapid changes of pace and to one such delivery, stood rooted to the top of his crease, vaguely pushing down the wrong line and taking it on the pad.

Next up, Sehwag. Who, in a situation where someone had to get a move on, slapped a drive at Klusener, before he had been out there long enough to read the bowler's changes of pace, and hit straight to mid off.

From 100/0, India suddenly found itself 178/5 and Ajit Agarkar was promoted to try and do something about it. Meanwhile Dravid, having first been instrumental in digging a bit of a hole for India, was now expected to buckle down and dig the side back out of it.

The 200 came up in the 39th over -- which, when you think about it, was quicker than South Africa's effort, only India didn't have a Klusener and Rhodes to power the team through at the death. Agarkar sacrificed his wicket shortly after that landmark, when Dravid on drove straight and hard to midwicket and took off for the run. Realising that one of the two batsmen was a goner, Agarkar crossed his vice captain, then walked out of the park.

All that trouble nearly went to waste when, off the first ball of the next over, Dravid slashed at Kallis and got a faint touch through to the keeper -- only, the umpire didn't hear the sound, and turned the appeal down. Two balls later, Dasgupta went -- again, a firm drive to the off side, a start, a hesitation, a stutter, and that was all Pollock needed to flash the throw to the bowler's end, Kallis managing to get a hand on it and deflect onto the stumps.

At the end of 40, India were 210/7 -- needing 73 more in ten overs, which is a decent ask in the slog phase, but without the wickets to make a job of it. All South Africa had to do was what they do best anyway -- bowl tight, field tight, and choke the chasing side down.

Harbhajan got himself a streaky four, then edged Andre Nel behind. The next ball, a regulation delivery outside off, saw Kumble stand in place, and extend his bat. Where have you seen that before? In the nets, when the coach gives the slip cordon catching practise. And Javagal Srinath, seen at one time as the all-rounder to replace Kapil Dev, reduced now to the number 11 slot (probably because there is no slot lower?) Dravid then played the shots he should have been playing much earlier, Srinath produced his regulation boundary and inevitably perished a ball later, and that was that.

At the end of it all, you sat back and you thought -- what team other than India could, in one and the same afternoon, display both the sublime and the ridiculous in batsmanship, switching seemingly without effort between the two?

Detailed scoreboard:

South African innings
Indian innings