Ok, here is my view on the situation.
"Everybody has seen what robbed India the game..there is no need to repeat it": Anil Kumble
The umpiring standard in the match was poor. It was bad for both sides but India got the worse of it. That being said, I refuse to believe that there was malicious intent from any of the umpires. India should not complain long about the umpiring because it will not happen again (since it was a mixture of low quality umpires and chance) and they have two more games to prove that they are the better team.
Michael Clarke should be ashamed of himself for claiming a catch which he grounded. The law is that if the ball touches the ground, without your direct conscious control (e.g. rolling it back to umpire), then it is not out. He grounded the ball because (as far as I am aware), he could not control his body and it was certainly not a conscious effort. This should be a large contributing factor against the 'honesty system'. I do not think that this was the umpires entire fault; ideally, they would have spotted it, but they and everyone in this thread at the time were looking at the actual catch and not the aftermath, I assume Benson was too.
On to the third Test; I think that Yuvraj's quadriple failure should earn him a big fat drop. His fielding which would otherwise have kept him in the team has been disappointing and 17 runs at 4.25 is not acceptable. He is hardly resting on past Test performances either, with a pretty ordinary average of 32.83 - with his hundreds and fifties coming in the flat tracks of either India or Pakistan. I would replace like for like (youthful fielders) and bring in Dinesh Karthik, with whom I would open the batting - demoting Dravid to number six in the process.
Wasim Jaffer's 22 runs at 5.50 is also not acceptable and I would drop him for Virender Sehwag. I was not a fan of Viru in the squad but I feel that you must replace Jaffer with a specialist opener who has done it at Test level (and is in the squad) and Sehwag is the only man for that job.
As for the bowling, I would keep Ishant Sharma in the team (for now). I never supported his inclusion in the team at such a young age but he did impress in the Test and, as far as I am concerned in judging his talent, he got the wicket of Symonds on 30. I would also bring in Vikram Singh for Harbhajan Singh. Harbhajan has taken 7 wickets at 51.71, which is not flash and I wish to be proactive on what will be a fast, bouncy Perth track - or so reports have told.
I would not play Pathan because, although he clocks high on the speed gun (up to 140kph), pace of the pitch is irrelevant for Pathan as he beats batsmen now with consistency and swing, not bounce or pace. If for anyone, Pathan should come in for Yuvraj, but I have made my thoughts clear that Dinesh Karthik is the better choice due to the opening conundrum.
Now for the moderator part. Try to keep swearing to a minimum please and stop riling Indian members up, Aussie fans. I understand that there is no malicious intent, but keep quiet unless you have something constructive on the situation to say or something to say on another situation. Indian fans are hurting and they will take anything as a cocky comment due to the rather fragile mindset that losing the opportunity to win the series and the umpiring decisions have left them in.
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