Indian Tour of Sri Lanka & Triangular Series, July-August 2010

[rocky_g]

Great victory for India.

 

[Params7]

VVS ftw. Disappointed to see Dravid not find his form though.

 

[AkshayS]

VVS ftw, I thought Sachin would get a 100 and VVS a fifty but it turned out to be opposite.

BTW, it's great, great win, good to see Raina continuing his dream run in Test matches.

 

[Gurjot95]

^ That's why VVS is so underrated.

 

[icyman]

VVS is classy,but highly under-rated. If you are playing Australia, it is only then, that people think he ll perform.
Was quite disappointed with Dravid. Hope he does find his form for the South African series.

Raina has come of age and was very much impressed with the kind of maturity he has has shown. Quite unlike Yuvraj. I believe that we have finally found a good replacement for Sourav Ganguly.

 

[AkshayS]

Raina has come of age and was very much impressed with the kind of maturity he has has shown. Quite unlike Yuvraj. I believe that we have finally found a good replacement for Sourav Ganguly.

I agree, Raina is looking to have the mentallity of test cricket, ghe's so positive in batting that he doesn't make any faults. I loved him batting thaty way.

 

[SaiSrini]

Awesome win for India. One of our most satisfying, since we went with a very inexperienced bowling attack. Where are all those guys who said we cant take 20 wickets and win a test match? When the wicket offers something, our bowling attack becomes highly potent even if its inexperienced. On dull pitches, we might not take 20 wkts but we also dont let the opposition do the same, most of the time (we batted badly at Galle).

Mithun and Ojha are the positives for us from the bowling point of view. Ishant seems to be coming back. Disappointed with Mishra, he looks toothless even on a helpful track. Once Zaheer, Sree and Bhaj come back, our bowling should look good. Raina should easily keep Yuvraj out of the test side for sometime now.

 

[Varun]

Mithun and Ojha are the positives for us from the bowling point of view

He also impressed with the bat. Sort of a test-all rounder but that is too early to say that.

 

[SaiSrini]

VVS is classy,but highly under-rated. If you are playing Australia, it is only then, that people think he ll perform.
Was quite disappointed with Dravid. Hope he does find his form for the South African series.

Raina has come of age and was very much impressed with the kind of maturity he has has shown. Quite unlike Yuvraj. I believe that we have finally found a good replacement for Sourav Ganguly.

Agree! For me, he looks the ideal replacement for Dada's spot that was left empty in our test team. And it would be an insult to Raina to compare his fielding with Dada.

 

[Iridium]

I must say that I wasn't expecting India to win this Test after their performances in the first two Tests. Great to see Raina show everyone that he has what it takes to play Test cricket.

 

[icyman]

I feel the youngsters have done pretty well out here. Bowling was'nt really that great. As a number 1 team, your bench strength needs to prove its worth on any kind of wicket. In this game, the spinners got a lot from the pitch and thus the result. On the Galle wicket too, our bowlers could have put in some more effort.
Overall, the performance was good,not one that I would expect from the team ranked number one in Tests though. As far as the batting sector is concerned, Yuvraj's replacement must be found. He seems to lack the temperament or the ability to play Tests. It is high time now Subramanium Badrinath got a chance. Rohit Sharma too is another player we could look at in the near future.

 

[SaiSrini]

I feel the youngsters have done pretty well out here. Bowling was'nt really that great. As a number 1 team, your bench strength needs to prove its worth on any kind of wicket. In this game, the spinners got a lot from the pitch and thus the result. On the Galle wicket too, our bowlers could have put in some more effort.
Overall, the performance was good,not one that I would expect from the team ranked number one in Tests though. As far as the batting sector is concerned, Yuvraj's replacement must be found. He seems to lack the temperament or the ability to play Tests. It is high time now Subramanium Badrinath got a chance. Rohit Sharma too is another player we could look at in the near future.

But you must bear in mind that our team was depleted (our better bowler, Zaheer didnt play the series and Harbhajan didnt play the third test and was in bad fitness in Galle). Even Sreesanth who is a better test bowler than Ishant, didnt play.

As far as batting, Pujara is the best replacement. He is in the Dravid mould, and is a run accumulator. Dravid seems to be tapering off, so Pujara should be blooded. I dont see a future for Badri because they have discarded him inspite of not giving him enough rope. Now that Raina has succeeded, Rohit could also be tried to see how he does. I guess Yuvraj's life in tests has been made miserable.

 

[Gaurav_7]

As far as batting, Pujara is the best replacement. He is in the Dravid mould, and is a run accumulator. Dravid seems to be tapering off, so Pujara should be blooded. I dont see a future for Badri because they have discarded him inspite of not giving him enough rope. Now that Raina has succeeded, Rohit could also be tried to see how he does. I guess Yuvraj's life in tests has been made miserable.

Pujara surely should be tried. Raina is easily keeping Yuvraj out of the Test side. I'm not sure about Rohit Sharma actually. I'd like to keep Dravid in there still. Had Laxman not scored today, I'm sure we would go out saying both Dravid & Laxman have lost their touch. Dravid may well serve India still unless he himself wants to go out.

I'm pretty impressed by Mithun. The guy knows his game and did bowl with a lot of heart. His batting is very good too for a number 8-9.

 

[aditya123]

I was just trying to analyze the India performances in test cricket since 2007. People constantly talk about our bowling not being good enough to take 20 wickets. However, that is mostly beacuse generally people look at the bowling attack and search for a bowling great in there which India do not have. However, what we have done in these 2 years since the 2007 World Cup or even starting from 2002 has been to combine well as a unit and get results going our way.

Headingley 2002 where our seam attack was Agarkar, Zaheer (who was just starting his career) , Harbhajan and Kumble who weren`t rated overseas but still we managed to win it. Same was the case in Australia in 2003 where Kumble stepped up and took 20 wickets and when it mattered , even Agarkar came up with that effort at Adelaide to win us the game. Again, versus Australia in 2008, Zaheer got injured after the first test and we had RP, Ishant and Irfan winning the test for us. England 2007 and Jo`burg 2006 where we had Sree, RP and Co. supporting Zaheer and winning us test matches.

The case has been the same at home tests. Zaheer has been exceptional and has been highly underrated. He has been picking big wickets game after game against sides like England, Australia or SA where he made guys like Strauss, Hayden or Smith his bunny. The guy may not have a bowling average of 22 but he has been as influential in our test success as any. Noone ever complains about Lee or Flintoff having a bowling average in tests of above 30 but would you argue about Johnson being better than them because his average is lower?

I don`t know. There is something about this team in tests where we may not look threatening in test cricket with our bowling but we seem to know how to get results in our favor. Since 2002, man to man, most attacks would seem b etter than India`s, but if you look at overseas records since 2000, we have been the second most successful side overseas. The reason, I`m yet to understand.

 

[pcfan123]

Raina ftw, would not have wanted Yuvraj to play that role.