Challenger Series Final

Yuvraj was MOS
By Max1 - 15 Sep '03
September 15 2003

The pitch in Bangalore for the final of the one-day Challenger series was slow and low. It is difficult to understand the purpose of practising on such pitches ahead of a tour of Australia.

The pitches used for both the semifinal and final of the one-day Challenger series (both between India 'A' and India 'B') were flat and lifeless. The same pitches had a bit of bounce for the fast bowlers during the first 2 games, but by the weekend had flattened out, and were dead and slow.

I don't know whats the purpose of practising on such pitches ahead of a tour of Australia. On these pitches the fast bowlers go for runs, and mediocre pie chuckers like JP Yadav and Dinesh Mongia look like world beaters, with the ball not coming on to bat. And then we wonder why we aren't able to win away from home.

This time, India 'A' won the toss and had no hesitation in batting first. Sachin Tendulkar and Gautam Gambhir opened the batting. Ajit Agarkar, in his opening spell for India 'B', was wayward. Amit Bhandari, on the other hand, surprisingly bowled with much more aggression and commitment than he had showed in the initial 2 matches. He also bowled a tight line and kept the batsmen quiet.

But once again, just like in the semifinal Saturday, after the batsmen got used to the flat, slow pitch, they found batting easy. Gambhir even stepped out and hit Bhandari for a four through the offside.

Sachin played a couple of his characteristic square-cuts and flicks off the pad, but was still not playing 100% despite his Man of Match-winning 88 (he handed that over to Sriram, whose excellent 70 he rated better). Gambhir was the first to fall as he holed out to Dinesh Mongia. This brought Kaif to the crease and he started picking the singles, giving Tendulkar the strike. The run rate was healthy. JP Yadav was then brought on and he bowled straight and slow. But with ball not coming on to bat, he was very difficult to score against. However, the same Yadav bowling on bouncy Australian pitches would likely be thrashed about with ease.

Tendulkar brought up his 50, and then started increasing the tempo. Kaif played sensibly throughout the partnership. Towards the end, it was once again Sreedharan Sriram and Rohan Gavaskar who were left to push the score above 300. Both batted sensibly, picking singles, running well and putting away the bad balls. Nothing flashy, but very professional cricket. Once the India 'A' score reached 300, it was a foregone conclusion that they would win the match.

JP Yadav was sent out to open the India 'B' innings. But he didn't look the part of an international batsman, and the same goes for Vijay Bharadwaj.

Dinesh Mongia, MoM in the previous match with a brilliant 122, was injured and unable to bat. Rahul Dravid and Yuvraj Singh tried to bring India 'B' back into the match and batted well for a while, finding the boundary regularly. But Sachin foxed Dravid and bowled him. The match was all but over right then. Later, wicketkeeping hopeful Thilak Naidu was run out, and the rest of the innings was a mere formality.

A note about Naidu: unfortunately, his keeping leaves a lot to be desired. He missed 2 stumping chances: one off Badani in the earlier game, and another off Sachin in the final. He also struggled to collect balls going down the legside. Looks like India just cannot find a keeper who can both bat and keep well!