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The Achilles heel

The team management wanted to play Saurav Ganguly in the three-day game against the President's Eleven on October 2-4.

But Saurav wanted out, and coach Anshuman Gaekwad accomodated him.

At the back of the southpaw's mind, for a while now, has been the niggling fear of injury -- specifically, the hamstring injury that kept him out of the second game of the Sahara Cup against Pakistan last month, in Toronto.

In the previous game, even as he was on his way to winning his fifth Man of the Match award against Pakistan, Saurav was hampered by a hamstring pull and had to leave the field before the formalities of victory were completed. He was back for the final three games but no longer a force to reckon with, as a bowler at least, that he had been in Toronto till then.

In fact, given that Ganguly, with his mind on his hamstring, was not bowling to his best form, there is a school of thought that holds that he should not have been given the ball in the final two games, where he went for over 100 runs in just none overs.

On this tour, he has as usual added another MOM award to a rapidly growing collection, when he scored his fifth hundred in his 78th one-day international during the second Hero Honda fixture. Even here, though, his hamstring was obviously bothering him -- thus, he never ran between wickets at full tilt, and was seen clutching at the back of his leg every now and again.

You ask him about his injury and he does not duck the question. There is this admirable quality about this Bengal batsman, who Geoffrey Boycott delights in calling the "Prince of Calcutta," that he is straight as an arrow, without a devious bone in his body.

He readily admits that injuries are something the modern Indian cricketer has to learn to live with, given that the schedule never does allow time for healing. "I heard that the Challenger teams were to be announced today," Saurav said, while munching pulses from a bowl and watching the Indian batsmen plunder runs out in the middle at the Sunrise Sports Club on Saturday.

He knows he has to play in that series, and should be hating it, considering that the Challengers start on the 15th, just four days after the one off Test against Zimbabwe ends. All top cricketers have to make themselves available for this somewhat mindless exercise. However, his interest in the team composition for that series is apparently because he wants to see who is in and who is out, in a bid to get some insight into the collective mind of the new selection committee.

Saurav has a wry smile as he reflects on the crowded cricketing schedule in the coming months. The Challenger, then Dhaka, Sharjah, New Zealand, Pakistan, again Sharjah and Dhaka (for the Asia Cup) before the World Cup next May.

"Actually, if Pakistan does not come it would not be too bad for cricketers who are looking for rest," said Ganguly. The BCCI has indicated that if Pakistan opts out then Sri Lanka will be invited, I remind him. "A visit by Sri Lanka is not the same thing as one by Pakistan," said Ganguly. "With Pakistan, you know the entire country is watching you all the time, and that adds to the pressure."

Interesting statement that, because no contemporary Indian cricketer has won as many games for India against Pakistan as Saurav has, with both bat and ball. In fact, his detractors continue to speak of his running between wickets and fielding as negatives -- without, however, focussing on the positive side of his cricket, which includes his match-winning batting and his ability to bowl partnership-breaking spells in the middle. Also overlooked is the impact the left-right combo of Tendulkar and Ganguly has had on the opposing bowling lineups.

That Saurav is conscious of figures is reflected when he mentions his fifth hundred in 78 matches and goes on to ask who has the second best record in terms of centuries, among the Indian cricketers. "Azhar has seven, isn't it?" asks Saurav. Unintentional, perhaps, but as he says those words, you can't help thinking in your own mind that Azhar's seven tons have come from just one ODI short of the 300 mark.

In ODIs, he has something of a dream run -- 78 ODIs, over 2000 runs, five hundreds. The story of his Test career though is entirely different. He had his maiden century on debut in the second Test at Lord's - "All fate," says Saurav, reflecting on the fact that the pitch for the first Test, at Edgbaston, was extremely difficult to bat on.

Following that impressive debut, Saurav was promoted to number three, but by the time the South African tour came around, it was Rahul Dravid who filled that berth, while Saurav was down to number five and, later, number six.

The number six spot is always dicey -- for one thing, the new ball comes due around that time and for another, there are only tailenders for company -- more so since Mongia, more often than not, is filling the opener's slot.

Yet, Ganguly has succeeded in that slot, and interestingly, his partnership with Tendulkar, which extends to the Test arena as well, has had some good essays with the bat in that form of the game. (The two also have a common business manager, Mark Mascarenhas of WorldTel -- and just incidentally, these are the only two cricketers Mark manages).

Saurav admits that good though his career is, it could get even better if his fitness improved, as also his running between wickets. The latter, he agrees, does affect his mates -- Tendulkar, Azhar, Jadeja, Dravid, especially the last three who get a large proportion of their runs in singles and who are looking to dart down the track at the slightest opportunity. With Saurav at the other end, this becomes difficult.

Ganguly says he is working on these two aspects, and appears only too aware that he has a role to play in Indian cricket. Still young, he says he is aware that only fitness will help him have an extended career in international cricket.

For now, though, his entire energies are concentrated on ensuring that his hamstring holds up, reasonably well, in the months ahead.