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India beat Pak by 5 wickets

When you have your emotions vested in a team (whether a reporter should have his emotions vested in what he is reporting on is another question for another time), you tend to look for positives.

And the game today provided one, as clearly etched as if someone had done some effective skywriting.

In times past, a crushing defeat had the longer term impact of crushing the spirit out of the Indians. The defeat in the first game was as crushing as they come, and while chatting with a friend this morning, I was making the point that it would be incredibly difficult for the Indians to lift themselves for the game today. For one thing, recovery -- we are talking mental recovery here -- time was brief, given they were playing back to back. Second, not only did they have to lift themselves out of a deep trough, they had to do it against Pakistan, in Sharjah -- neither the opposition, nor the venue, that finds them at their best in the best of times.

Perhaps it is a mirage, perhaps it is an indication of a new spirit in the side, but today, the Indians came out focussed, with the ball and in the field. And turned in a performance in the field that has few if any recent parallels.

Every single bowler was on target and bowled to the field set for him. They bowled well in pairs, supplementing each other. And the fielders dived, flung themselves around, cut off shots and in general, gave the bowling that extra edge. Cumulatively, it was a performance that broke Pakistan's nerve.

In yesterday's match report, we had discussed how Srinath's recent prodigality was having a domino effect on the rest of the bowling. Today, Srinath was rested -- for injury, is the word from the management -- and Prasad brought in. And the difference became immediately apparent. Prasad bowled well within himself, kept things very tight, and immediately, Agarkar at the other end was able to attack more. Further, this meant that Kumble could delay the advent of his slower bowlers.

There is another aspect to the game that deserves mention. Yesterday, while India were taking a thrashing, the Pakistan players had arrived at the ground, and were seen laughing and sharing jokes, obviously at the expense of their prospective opponents. Somehow, the way they played in the first half of the morning, it looked like they had been lulled into a false feeling that all they had to do was turn up and go home winners. There was a touch of overconfidence early on, and when things went badly wrong, the collective nerve cracked. Pakistan, too, is labouring under a self-imposed handicap -- frequent management changes, frequent changes in captaincy and personnel, senior players absent for whatever reason -- in contrast to the way the Pakistanis are managing their cricket, the Indian team of Muthaiah, Dalmiya and Lele actually end up looking like masterminds.

Prasad struck early, thanks to a lovely piece of slip catching by Mohammad Azharuddin. The first ball of the second over of the innings was outside off, going through straight. Afridi leant back and looked to play the forcing slash, found the thick outer edge and as the ball flew low, Azhar dived to his right, and with very soft hands, took the catch and made it look easy.

Afridi's dismissal to the first ball he played put the brakes on Pakistan's plans of looking for a flying start. Razzaq, who normally plays anchor when he comes in at three, was sent out. But the defensive mindset proved Razzaq's worst enemy, as in the next over, Agarkar produced a very well disguised slower ball, Razzaq oscillated in that vacuum between defense and aggression, ended up pushing in front of his body, and gave cover the simplest of chances.

Pakistan could have been in bigger trouble had Robin, in the 5th over, reacted a touch quicker. The ball from Agarkar was outside off, Imran Nazir slashed, the ball was in the air but Robin waited that fraction too long before trying to get his hands up, and the ball went through him to the fence for four.

Inzamam ul Haq, whose ambitions of leading Pakistan are no secret, is now vice captain. And it seemed, from the way he batted, as though he had spent an hour before the mirror, doing the auto-suggestion bit: "I am the vice captain, I have to take my responsibilities seriously, I will bat sensibly" repeated over and over, that kind of thing. He would have been better off playing his own game -- time and again, to deliveries he would at other times have put away, Inzamam pushed gently around, not even working the ball off the square, and seemed on the whole to be batting in leg irons he had worn along with his socks.

At the other end, Imran Nazir showed fine touch against pace, and an attitude of aggression that is nice to see in a player that young. He tends to hit a lot on the up, and looks good playing in the V and square on the off. The advent of Kumble in the 11th over, however, slowed him down a touch. Nazir tends to get very square on playing spin, and found himself repeatedly playing inside the line of his pads. He did try, in the 15th over, to break the Kumble hold by whacking him for an onside six and then a four to third man, but in the very next over, Joshi, bowling at the start of what turned out to be a superb spell, took out his man when he pushed one through with the arm on a very full length, Nazir got his feet in a tangle looking to play to leg, hit all round it and was bowled middle stump, after a fine innings of 43.

Youhanna and Inzamam, with the job of batting Pakistan out of jail, curbed their natural instincts in a manner that was the antithesis of the Indians yesterday. Both ended up patting deliveries to the in fielders, Ganguly helped things along by keeping a tight field, with six, seven men inside the ring (a refreshing change from his two immediate predecessors, both of whom appeared to think that the field HAD to be spread after 15, and that it was against the rules to attack after that point), and the fielders, flinging themselves around enthusiastically, helped the good work right along.

The runs dried up. Pakistan's progression at this point read: 18/2 in 5; 35/2 in 10; 60/2 in 15; 71/3 in 20, 91/3 in 25. The pressure was mounting, something had to crack, it wasn't going to be the bowlers because by that time, they were in a good rhythm, Ganguly was rotating them around very nicely, the field was attacking, so the onus was on the batting. And Inzamam rose to the occasion with a mixup that even by his standards was horrendous. Youhanna pushed out on the off, and took off. Inzamam responded, came half way down the track, then stood there, watched his partner come towards him and incredibly, suddenly turned and raced Youhanna to the non-striker's end. For the life of me, I couldn't figure what Inzy thought he was doing there.

Saba Karim, who looked good ever since he's come back into the side, did superbly well, racing around, fielding, whipping off his glove and flinging the throw direct onto the hits at the bowler's end. At that point, both batsmen were out of the crease -- the same crease. One was out, what the third umpire had to figure was, who? The third umpire figured it was the striker, Youhanna.

I disagree, though. Youhanna had set off for the single. Inzamam had responded. The third umpire gave Inzy in because when the bails went off, Inzy's bat was fractionally ahead of Youhanna's. But I'd have thought that Inzy, as the man who was at the non-striker's end and who had failed to get back in, should have been the one walking back at that point.

In any case, since Youhanna had been given out at the non-striker's end, that meant that logically, Inzamam had to take strike to the next ball, though he was at the non-striker's end, too. And the mixup appeared to impact on his concentration. To the very next ball, he had a slashing cut at an innocuous ball outside off from Robin, got the edge and Karim, standing right up to the medium pacer, did very well yet again to take.

That meant that suddenly, Pakistan were 108/5. And Ganguly, by then, was making bowling changes like a Zen master. Younis Khan in, and immediately, Kumble brought in to test the inexperienced batsman. Slip, short square leg, silly point placed to add to the squeeze. And Kumble produced a flipper outside off, Khan shaped to cut too close to his body, and dragged it on to the stumps.

Between overs 25 and 30, thus, Pakistan lost 3 wickets for 19 runs -- a spell as bad as the two they lost in the first three overs. And when that kind of thing happens, the bowling side lifts itself a few notches more. Agarkar was brought back, and responded with a maiden in the 33rd. Kumble continued the good work with a maiden in the 34th. And the captain kept two close to the bat, brought six men inside the circle, dried up the singles and intensified the pressure -- this is something Ganguly does better than his two immediate predecessors, both of whom have tended to put mid off and mid on back outside the circle once the field restrictions are off, and let batsmen take easy singles and ease the pressure on themselves.

Akram lashed a six over long off off Joshi, another temptation to spread the field, but again, the field stayed tight, Prasad got the ball and as in his first spell, focussed on bowling a tight line, not giving the batsman either room, or pace, to work with. Akram went for a wild heave, looking to lift the bowler over long on, played all over it, and lost his off stump to a ball seaming back in at him.

Good fielding accounted for the next one. Moin played to mid on, Younis took off for the single that wasn't there, was sent back, slipped on the turn and was sprawled on the turf when Joshi, easily one of the slowest movers in the Indian side, raced in, fielded, and hit direct. That performance from Joshi shows how even bad fielders lift their game against the background of a good performance by his mates -- sort of the corollary of a good player losing it when others do a shoddy job.

Arshad Khan came in, Kumble came back, and cleaned him up with the quick flipper. The left Akthar, and Joshi, who bowled superbly throughout, took Moin Khan out with an indipper of full length, Moin looking to sweep, beaten by the dip, and trapped in front to end the Pakistan innings on 146.

All bowlers on view today did their bit and more, but for me, the key to the performance lay in the first five overs. No width was offered, there were no free hits available, tight bowling accounted for two wickets, and set the tone for the rest of the bowling -- a direct contrast to the previous day, when within the first five overs, SA had been allowed to race away to 30-odd.

India began its chase with Ganguly, yet again, looking for the aggressor's role while Sachin seemed content to let him do the hitting. I have no quarrel with Ganguly going after the bowling -- in fact, Ganguly, always a lovely strokemaker to watch, seems to have added to the excitement level inbuilt into his batting. What I don't get, though, is why Sachin increasingly is trying to play a game alien to his mindset. Anchoring is not his forte -- when he refrains from hitting his shots, he tends to get out early, and it would seem time someone told him there is nothing wrong with both batsmen attacking, since both openers are by nature strokeplayers.

Ganguly was looking on song, with some fluent driving, when his tendency to fuss too much caused his downfall. The sightscreen was as far across as it could get, but Ganguly seemed unhappy, wanted it moved more, a clear impossibility, muttered a bit, wandered around, and off the very next ball, chased after an Akram delivery wide of off going further, and touched it through to Moin.

Younis was bowling well enough, but Pakistan wanted some kind of blitz, and Moin turned to Akthar. Who promptly obliged with a fiery spell of fast bowling in course of which he clocked one in at 155.3 kmph (96.5 mph), the second fastest ball ever recorded, just a fraction under Jeff Thompson's 97.4 mph scorcher.

Sachin seemed comfortable against the pace, but his 'I'll only take singles" mindset accounted for his wicket. Akther bowled him one on off seaming to middle. It was a fullish length ball and the earlier Sachin, at that stage of the innings with the field in, would have punched it out on the on. Here, he tried to just shut the bat face and guide it gently out on the on. When you play the gentle push, your bat speed goes down, and when the bowler is bowling at that pace (a calculation showed that the batsman has 0.4 second to respond to the ball), the fractional lack of speed of the bat could make the vital difference. Here it did -- Sachin got it on the pad, and got the umpire's finger.

Then followed a quiet, sensible partnership. Given the low target (of which 41 runs had been got by the 12th over, leaving just 106 more to get), the temptation would have been to get macho, to try and blast the runs away. However, the three quick bowlers were bowling on top of their form, the ball was reverse swinging like a yo-yo, and any more wickets falling to indiscreet shot selection could have opened up the middle and lower order for Akthar and his cohorts to slice through. Instead, both Azhar and Dravid opted for quiet, sensible batting. The run progression tells the story: 17/0 in 5, 40/1 in 10, 45/2 in 15, 76/2 in 25, 106/2 in 30 (contrasted with 110/6 in 30 Pakistan). It was slow, attritive cricket. But the Indians appeared to be focussed on ensuring that Akthar, Akram and Younis couldn't break through. They probably figured, too, that the support bowling without Saqlain in the lineup had a weak look to it. And sure enough, when Razzaq with his gentler pace came on, the Indians began pushing the scoring, Azhar being particularly severe.

Razzaq appeared to have prompted the severity, what's more. While the Pakistan players love to have a go at the Indians, they generally leave Sachin and Azhar alone. Here, Razzaq produced a good bouncer to have Azhar in some trouble, and then needled him. It is not often Azhar's face takes on the look of a thundercloud -- but it did then. He turned to Moin and obviously complained, and it seemed as though Moin laughed it off. The next ball was smashed through cover and the second the ball hit the bat, Azhar instead of following the progress of the ball (to the cover boundary as it turned out) was glaring down the pitch at the bowler.

India moved up a gear from there, and into the 31st over, with 111 on the board needing just 36 more to win, the thus-far patient Dravid fell to a lazy shot. The ball was wide of off, Dravid reached a long way to drive, and tapped it tamely to short cover. It was a patient innings, what was needed in the circumstances, but it came to a tame end just when the Indians seemed to have it covered.

Azhar just kept going, and reached a fine 50. Alone among the batsmen on view today, he appeared to have read the pitch well, and while he looked very uneasy against the quick, short ball, handled the rest very well, playing late, using his wrists to take the pace off, guiding the ball around nicely, and keeping the board ticking over nicely. He too, however, fell to a tame shot, scooping ARshad Khan to mid on looking to go over the fielder.

When Azhar left, the score was 132. India needed 15 more. While big hitting would have been silly earlier, at this point, the Indians needed to just finish things off, especially since the spinners were on. Instead, Robin Singh and Ajay Jadeja played a bizzarre defensive game, adding just 13 runs, to none too tight spin bowling, in the next 26 balls, playing a lot of length balls gently back down the track, and generally wasting a lot of time out there -- time, and deliveries, that could come back to haunt them if the final berth goes into the net run rate equation. Defensive play against quality fast bowling early on is one thing -- but this was inexplicable. "I thought we batted badly at the end," Ganguly was to say later.

Robin finally fell trying a silly run, Karim showed he was no slouch at defense as he played out a maiden, until Jadeja finally ended things with a clean hit over mid on to give India a five wicket win.

"Our bowlers did very well, we fielded well, we've got the win we needed, now there are two days break, for us to rest, recoup, and get back to the top of our form before the next two back to back matches," was Ganguly's post match verdict.

Ganguly now has 4 wins to three defeats in his 7 games as captain this stint. Meanwhile, Moin for the first time as captain tasted defeat in an ODI.

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