Tendulkar, Sehwag save India's blushes

Play on day three started after a 40-minute delay due to rain -- and the climatic conditions produced a nicely juiced track, plus overcast conditions conducive to swing and seam.

England skipper Nasser Hussain has in a signed column on Wisden defended his tactics of day two. Fair enough, it is up to each captain to play the game the way he sees it, and to use his resources as best he thinks he can.

But there is such a thing as getting locked into a mindset, and the morning session produced the perfect example -- both from Hussain and his bowlers, and from Rahul Dravid.

Hussain had apparently carved into stone the ploy that he would use Ashley Giles to block one end up. How? Figures tell the story -- at lunchtime, Giles' figures read 27-16-34-0. Of these, an amazing 87.2 per cent was outside line of leg stump and a further 6.8 per cent was on leg stump. Tendulkar padded away 52.2 per cent of the deliveries he faced from Giles -- given the line and the leg-side bias of the field setting, there was little else he could do. There was, too, little the spectators could do about it all.

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At the other end, Flintoff started off over the wicket, got flicked through square leg, and immediately switched to round the wicket, bowling a good two feet outside the stumps until umpire A V Jayaprakash was forced to have a gentle word with him and suggest that he take a closer sighter at the stumps.

At the other end, Rahul Dravid batted as though, through some time warp, he had wandered into the Timeless Test. A certain amount of caution was dictated, yes -- but the way Dravid batted today, at no point even thinking of forcing the ball off the square, merely allowed the bowlers to climb, monkey-like, on his back and in the process, increase the pressure on India. Dravid has played good, even great, knocks in the past -- his supporting role to Laxman in Calcutta comes immediately to mind as an instance from the year just ending. But against that, his performance in this Test immeasurably added to the pressure on the batting side and, in particular, his batting partner.

The standoff would have continued ad infinitum had Flintoff not tired, forcing Hussain to bring in his other seam bowler, Mathew Hoggard. Less pacy than Flintoff, Hoggard bowled the line of off stump or just outside and immediately, with aid from the atmosphere and the pitch, began to make the ball move around.

And Dravid learnt, yet again, the lesson that there is a fine line between playing with circumspection, and not playing at all. After spending 61 deliveries of batting time for just three runs, the batsman still wasn't settled enough to resist pushing at a delivery that was almost identical to the ones Srinath had bowled to get rid of Hussain and Foster in the England innings -- homing in on off, seaming away, drawing the batsman into the push and finding the edge through to the keeper (India 121/4).

Saurav Ganguly walked out and walked back in the space of three deliveries, and there was deja vu again -- remember Ahmedabad? And innumerable other instances in recent times? -- as, to a ball angling across him, the batsman hung his bat out with absolutely no foot movement, opening his bat face to guide the ball to Mark Butcher at second slip (121/5).

Ganguly's slump has now gone way beyond the Plimsoll Line -- and the longer this goes on, the longer the Indian captain at the end of a match makes remarks on the "middle order let us down, tail didn't make enough runs" lines, the more his authority over the team will erode.

Virender Sehwag, early on, had a slice of luck when Mathew Hoggard squared him up with another lovely exhibition of seam bowling, the ball homing in on off and middle then going the other way to find the edge. Andrew Flintoff at second slip dived but just failed to get his fingers under the ball.

Against that, Sehwag refused to let the bowling, or the situation, dictate his play. Faced by three slips and two gullies, Sehwag guided one neatly through the slip-gully cordon for a four to avert the follow on, then followed up with a square drive through the gully-point cordon for another four, ending the over with a whipped brace through square leg.

Through what remained of the session, Sehwag kept having his share of problems with deliveries seaming around line of off, but kept looking for scoring opportunities and in the process, showing up the two batsmen who had gone before.

The highpoint of the morning session, though, was the skill on view when Tendulkar, to bat Giles out of the attack, twice went right back, let a ball turn from outside leg to leg stump, and opened the bat face to guide delicately to third man for braces, and in the process combat that line.

England's gameplan was obvious -- keep the ball out of Tendulkar's reach, and attack at the other end. And it worked, as India ended the session with 50 runs to show for 24 overs faced, at 2.08 per over for the loss of two wickets. India went in on 149/5, with Tendulkar batting 77 off 178 deliveries and Sehwag 20 off 30.

A drizzle during the break drenched the outfield sufficiently to again delay start of play. That it also freshens the pitch up for the England seamers is, of course, an unwelcome byproduct for the home side.

The Indian batsmen came out seemingly determined to end the stalemate. Sehwag kicked things off by blasting Hoggard through mid off and, in the next over, when Giles bowled to him outside leg, rocked back and smashed him through long on for another boundary.

At the other end, Tendulkar after being beaten off successive deliveries by a Hoggard bowling the best he has on this tour, went after Giles. The first shot was a waltz down the track, running around the ball to hit through long on a la Sehwag. The next ball was even further outside leg, and Tendulkar with a controlled sweep beat both short fine leg and orthodox fine leg to the fence. Another controlled leg side shot saw him more to 88 and in the process get to his 1000 Test runs in his 10^th Test of the year, at an average of 66.6 that is bettered only by Jacques Kallis.

12 runs came in the Giles over, and Sehwag at the other end continued to party. Shrugging off his umpteenth played-and-missed outside off, he waited on a full length delivery and smashed it through point for four. The next over saw Giles begin with two deliveries so wide of leg that Tendulkar couldn't even get his bottom to it. The tactic worked -- an annoyed Tendulkar jumped down the track to the third ball, Giles held it back just a fraction, the batsman missed with the attempt to hit over long on, and was stumped for the first time ever in Test cricket. Tendulkar 90 off 198 balls, India 173/6 and the end of a partnership that produced 52 runs for the 6^th wicket at 3.03. To see the innings in context, you need to consider that barring his non-striker, the other five batsman had scored 28, 0, 12, 3 and 0.

The exit of Tendulkar was the signal, seemingly, for Sehwag to overcompensate. The wrists came into play with a whipped four off Hoggard off a perfectly good delivery. The next over saw the batsman dance down to Giles, cover the angle and whack him high over long on for four, then rock back to the next ball and nearly decapitate short square leg with a pull that rocketed to the boundary. Another Giles over, another dance, to change the line of the ball and hammer it, this time back over the bowler's head, for another four.

Immediately thereafter, the umpires' light meters told them something not immediately apparent to the naked eye, light was offered, and off the players went. India at the interruption was 197/6, with Sehwag on a blistering 49 off 68 balls with nine fours, and Kumble batting 6 off 16. 65 overs remained to be bowled at that point, and India were trailing England by 139 runs.

The players resumed after a 25-minute break and Sehwag promptly flicked Hoggard to get to his 50 (72 balls, 9 fours). And celebrated with a reverse sweep hit as hard and well as a regular sweep, off Giles, followed next ball by another of his dances down the track to smash the ball through long on with blistering force.

The assault on Giles yielded dividends -- and a lesson to his higher-placed mates in the batting order. Hussain took the left arm spinner off, and took the new ball despite Hoggard being a touch tired from a long spell. It was easy enough to see why -- a Dravid, for instance, had played 34 deliveries from Giles without scoring a single run. Against that, Sehwag had blasted the same bowler for 26 runs, including 6 fours, off just 27 deliveries.

The new ball produced the wicket when the tireless Hoggard yet again produced the ball that, between him and Flintoff and Srinath, has been the most dangerous on this track -- from wide of the crease angling in, squaring the batsman in defence then seaming away to find the edge through to the keeper. It ended a knock that came as a breath of fresh air after two and a half dull days, Sehwag walking back with 66 off 88 (13 fours), India at that point 218/7, still 118 behind.

Rain bucketed down while tea was taken -- and despite a few inspections and applications of the super sopper, no further play was possible.

Against that, there will be two sessions of two and a half hours apiece, tomorrow, to try and make up lost time -- assuming, that is, that the rain stays away.

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