Australia's Tour Of India - 2008

[vaibhav mehta]

It's going to be a draw now for sure. The Indians are going to survive this test.

Yup It was draw.But soon after Sehwag's wicket on last day I thought same that Australia were going to survive this test as with Sehwag 300 could be chaseable any day.

vaibhav mehta added 6 Minutes and 14 Seconds later...

We difinately played better, we use our part time spinners. We have no Gilly or Langer now. White and Watson cannot be count as great replacements. Stuey clark was even ill so he was not even properly used. See your lineups, fully balanced and more experienced. Hayden twice crap dismissal : and still you say you played better ???? It was your players who told they going to crush us as we are underdogs and way less experinced. At the end of day you all were busy to keep ur arse save ....

Actually this is a very lame argument that you don't have Gilly or Langer!!
White is by all means a great replacement.He is very talented and bright prospect for Australian cricket.
Also on Prior note Kumble and Bhajji have not been able to perform as per their abilities and also Kumble was injured just like Clarke.
If Australian part timers have bowled well then you certainly need to think about your bench strength that What would have happened If you had quality spinner on 5th day?

 

[sifter132]

We could have chased 299 had Viru and Gambhir fired: Kumble


http://cricket.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/3591295.cms

Its easy to say,but frankly in my opinion,even if they would have got good start,it would have been a bit difficult,unless Shewag bats for 2 sessions,no need of saying anything further,because when he bats he lashes out the bowlers,also batting on 5th day was more difficult too.So in my opinion,Sachin,Laxman batted really well,few balls were really keeping low,both senior bastman read it well..

Well of course - but we could play "what ifs" all day. I mean what if there were no clouds about - Ponting would have delayed the declaration a bit more. What if Test cricket lasted for 6 days? Then Watson wouldn't have thrown his wicket away and Australia would have batted all the way down and set India over 400 to win. What if Sharma has got Ponting LBW when he offered no stroke in the first hour of play?

Well I would say it was great match.Great cricket from both of the teams.But I don't agree that Australia played better than India,not at least after the partnership between Zaheer and Hrabhajan.
India have not finished the day with tailenders.We still had Dhoni to bat on last day.
Game was evenly balanced after each inning.But on the fifth day after the lost of Sehwag actually India have played better.

Well if you want to completely discount the first half of the game, then sure the teams played about the same. But Australia was always in front and India were getting smashed until Harbhajan and Zaheer had their little session of luck/complacency from Australia. Sure the last 2 days played out pretty closely, India probably played slightly better, but only because Tendulkar, Laxman and Ganguly managed to hold on the last day.

 

[SaiSrini]

Well I would say it was great match.Great cricket from both of the teams.But I don't agree that Australia played better than India,not at least after the partnership between Zaheer and Hrabhajan.
India have not finished the day with tailenders.We still had Dhoni to bat on last day.
Game was evenly balanced after each inning.But on the fifth day after the lost of Sehwag actually India have played better.

Australia have the right players most of the time, and are better skilled than India to always play better cricket than India. But India have the skill to beat Australia inspite of playing not so better cricket than him. For India, most of the time its about a few individual brilliances that win them the test matches.

saisrini80 added 2 Minutes and 29 Seconds later...

We difinately played better, we use our part time spinners. We have no Gilly or Langer now. White and Watson cannot be count as great replacements. Stuey clark was even ill so he was not even properly used. See your lineups, fully balanced and more experienced. Hayden twice crap dismissal : and still you say you played better ???? It was your players who told they going to crush us as we are underdogs and way less experinced. At the end of day you all were busy to keep ur arse save ....

There is no award or prize that is given to the team that played better. So we better end this discussion right here, because we are just feeding our own ego's here by saying "my team played better"

 

[Will_NA]

Oh for a quick seaming pitch so we could see some interesting cricket...

 

[SaiSrini]

Well if you want to completely discount the first half of the game, then sure the teams played about the same. But Australia was always in front and India were getting smashed until Harbhajan and Zaheer had their little session of luck/complacency from Australia. Sure the last 2 days played out pretty closely, India probably played slightly better, but only because Tendulkar, Laxman and Ganguly managed to hold on the last day.

Luck, my foot! Both of them played normal cricketing shots most of the time. Yes, they might have played some unorthodox shots, but most of the time, their game was normal. And they are classified as "tail". To show that sort of resilence when the opposition is on the top is admirable. If the batsman does not play well, even if you're complacent, you can get the wickets.

saisrini80 added 0 Minutes and 57 Seconds later...

Oh for a quick seaming pitch so we could see some interesting cricket...

I doubt if it will be a seaming pitch. But it will definitely be a pitch that has good bounce and pace for the fast bowlers (as traditional Mohali wickets are)

 

[deerkick]

Indian fans just need to admit that Aussie did indeed play a better game than us for the first test.There were a lot of negatives in our game, such as poor fielding, and uh.. Kumble

Positives were Ishant/Zaheer bowling partnership. Harbhajan's ball to Hussey was pure gold too. Our middle order is still fragile IMO. For some reason, to me they look really uncomfortable. It seems like Hussey alone can outscore the Fab 4. Anyways, hope Sehwag and Gambhir click again next test.

 

[shravi]

Drop Kumble. Drop Kumble. Drop Kumble. I said it during the series vs South Africa. Don't tell me he's going through a bad patch. He's 38 and he's done his job. It's time for him to retire before he goes out with some very average stats to show. He has kept young spinners out for too long. We must expose them now and give them international experience as there is no substitute for it. Sure, experience is useful and all that but what good is experience when you can no longer provide a good performance to show it's actually worth something. Then you will say that experience shows that you are a proven performer. However, Kumble has been on a downward slope for now and has shown no signs of improving. If he was 30-34 I would understand, but hes 38! He's far past his expiry date in my honest opinion. I respect Kumble for all he's done but at the moment, he's a liability.

 

[sifter132]

Luck, my foot! Both of them played normal cricketing shots most of the time. Yes, they might have played some unorthodox shots, but most of the time, their game was normal. And they are classified as "tail". To show that sort of resilence when the opposition is on the top is admirable. If the batsman does not play well, even if you're complacent, you can get the wickets.

I half agree. By the end of their partnership once they were in, there were some good shots played. But when Harbhajan first came in Australia was bowling White and Clarke in tandem trying to get through some overs for the sake of the over rate. There was not much pressure on him and it allowed him to play himself in, despite a few miscues. He played and missed to Clarke occasionally, was nearly caught at cover off White. By the time Johnson came back on he was 20. Johnson got Ganguly, then Zaheer came in and played and missed to Johnson a fair bit. Zaheer managed to get it between slip and gully a couple of times too. I don't think we can class that as quality batting. Harbhajan played better of the two, playing the quicks quite well once he got to 30 or so, but Zaheer was streaky. That over where he upper cutted Watson and then slogged him down the ground was to me an example of his fortune, not his magical batting ability. 4th morning he was hardly looking like Mr Invincible either, edging for four, playing and missing, with the very occasional classy looking shot to make everyone believe he's better than he is.

Sure they played pretty well for tailenders, but lets not pretend they batted with great technique and quality. Zaheer coming out and saying they couldn't get us out blah blah is pretty stupid IMO. I'm not saying they didn't play well, lets just not overrate their performance OK?

 

[Mr.Cricket]

Zaheer had fair bit to say in the media after the game:

So we play defensive crikcet now eh ? When you consider that we were the only team trying to win the game , I wonder what he would call the type of cricket India played. Make no mistake India knew they had NO chance to win after about 2 1/2 days. Thats why they blatantly tried to waste time to delay our declaration. On 5th day they bowled 30 balls in 30 minutes , now you can spin this anyway you want but its just clear time wasting.

He also had a crack at our spinners. What about the so called 'worldclass' spinners you have , how did they go ?

Aussie Spinners - 3/166
Indian Spinners - 3/339

Heres a message for you Zaheer , worry about your own team first champ.

 

[jkartik]

He also had a crack at our spinners. What about the so called 'worldclass' spinners you have , how did they go ?

Aussie Spinners - 3/166
Indian Spinners - 3/339

Heres a message for you Zaheer , worry about your own team first champ.

ok....first of all....if your spinners had bowled on DAY 1 it would have
been much worse than ours....and second of all....kumble SUCKED !!! he had a shocker of a test match.
even cameron white was better than him...!

harbhajan was a completely different bowler in the 2nd innings...
the wicket of hussey says it all..!!!

 

[sohum]

I think the, arguably, two part-time Australian spinners did a decent job. I say two part timers, since Clarke is a batter who bowls a bit, and that's what White's career seems to have become in recent years. They did as equally a job good statistically as the Indian spinner who were supposedly their major threat in a home series. Whether that casts a good light on the performances of Clarke and White or a dark cloud on the performances of Kumble and Harbajhan is debatable.

The fourth innings of the match was when the Australian spinners were used extensively, and by then it is safe to claim that India weren't really trying to score runs. When the pitch was not cracking up or conducive to spin, the spinners hardly got a bowl because they would have had their butts handed to them. White and Clarke combined for 30 overs in the first innings, which was more than 10 overs fewer than either Kumble or Bhajji bowled in India's first bowling performance. So the statistical claim doesn't really make any sense, since the conditions and context was changing drastically over time.

 

[SciD]

Bangaluru curse has been waved off by Indians thankfully and now action shifts to Mohali. Well Aussies again start favourites in my books to win this tie. The weather is great with tempratures at 24 C and morning sessions will be intresting with temp dipping below 20 C and overnight sweating under covers. All this makes for advantage to Aussie pacers.

Bret Lee and Katich have some knowledge of pitch having been home ground for Kings XI but that was diffrent time of year and tired and dead pitches. I doubt we will see any grass on wicket therfore I expect the first 3 days to be batting feast and after that the pitch looses its strength and becomes dead. Scoring becomes slow but its not difficilt to get out. Draw can be salvged by Indians if they believe they can still score runs in test match cricket.

No reverse swing will assist pacers so they will rely on patience and there pace to get wickets. Aussies will definately miss spinner here as man with midas touch Clarke will not be effective on this wicket. They would be rather adviced to have another pacer for white as he hardly bowled in last test match and you dont need batter coming at number 8.

 

[sohum]

So we play defensive crikcet now eh ? When you consider that we were the only team trying to win the game , I wonder what he would call the type of cricket India played. Make no mistake India knew they had NO chance to win after about 2 1/2 days. Thats why they blatantly tried to waste time to delay our declaration. On 5th day they bowled 30 balls in 30 minutes , now you can spin this anyway you want but its just clear time wasting.

Anyone with the service of an eye would notice that Australia's tactics were fairly defensive. The field was spread well out for the most part, and Australia were trying to wait out the Indians rather than get them out. Strangely, this has been Australia's most successful tactic against India, probably because our batsmen are great strokemakers. When they get bogged down, they get frustrated and take wickets. So, in this case, Australia's best form of attack was defense, rather than the cliched opposite saying.

He also had a crack at our spinners. What about the so called 'worldclass' spinners you have , how did they go ?

Aussie Spinners - 3/166
Indian Spinners - 3/339

Heres a message for you Zaheer , worry about your own team first champ.

Like I've said in a reply earlier, you have to look at the situations under which they were used. Australia's spinners were hardly used in the first innings because they would have been tonked. And in the second innings, they came in at a time when the batsmen were not really looking for runs. Traditionally, as a spinner, that is a great time to pick up wickets, especially since the batsmen aren't changing anything to alter your game. Despite that and the crackening pitch, the spinners were quite useless.

I think it's pretty easy to argue that Australia's spinners are in quite a lower league than India's. And of course Zaheer wasn't been entirely serious... he's just trying to play mindgames. I have no problems with him singling out players for criticism, seeing that Ponting has had no issues, as his team captain, to be spitting about thoughts about our middle order at any opportunity.

 

[SciD]

He also had a crack at our spinners. What about the so called 'worldclass' spinners you have , how did they go ?

Aussie Spinners - 3/166
Indian Spinners - 3/339

Heres a message for you Zaheer , worry about your own team first champ.

Our 2 fast bowlers took more wickets than you 3 World Class Top 3 test bowlers.

 

[rickyp]

ok....first of all....if your spinners had bowled on DAY 1 it would have
been much worse than ours....and second of all....kumble SUCKED !!! he had a shocker of a test match.
even cameron white was better than him...!

harbhajan was a completely different bowler in the 2nd innings...
the wicket of hussey says it all..!!!

That's not an argument, white and clarke both sucked, but they performed better than your world class spinners. It seems a lot of cricketers these days are dial-a-quote's, Zaheer can only have based his comments on past experiences and not the game at hand. Much similar his references to our aggression, when the Indians were the ones playing for the draw.