Spinning it our Way

Yesterday, India won the third test comfortably with 8 wickets to spare. Bhajji and Viru shared the spoils with Ishant and Sree doing some damage, India outshone South Africa completely. Last week, when given a green top, like one expected in South Africa or in New Zealand, the Indian team collapsed during the first innings. This brings us to the important question being asked in Indian cricket nowadays?

"Should we prepare sporting wickets or we are better off sticking to our traditional strength"

This question is better answered by Dhoni's remarks yesterday during the presentation ceremony. His words were "If we go to Australia, we get bouncy tracks; when we go to England, we get swinging tracks. When you come to India, you expect turning and bouncing tracks, and that's what this one was. It's better to stick to the specialties of certain places."

In India, with a lot of effort being put to produce sporting tracks, traditional venues like Kolkata and Chennai, which used to produce very good result oriented tracks have become flat batting tracks. The relaying of pitches, changing the soil from the previously used ones to the foreign soil has resulted in these venues losing its charm. Hence, playing spoilsport and becoming really skewed and one sided. Ideally, everybody expects India to produce spinning wickets, hence it is better off we preparing a turner than trying to please the whole cricketing world to produce sporting wickets. Nobody questions the pitch expert in Headingly, when there is prodigious swing on offer saying he has produced a bad pitch. Neither there are any comments when Perth produces a lightening fast pitch with bounce.

But with FTP in place, everybody tours the other country every few years. Players have now become accustomed to the different nature of the pitches in different countries. Australia have been able to win in India, and India have won a series in England and West Indies. This kind of regular touring helps player develop. But if the nature of pitches are same all over the world, then my guess is cricket will become very boring. The different nature of the pitches all over the world gives rise to different tactics and methods, which makes cricket gripping and worth watching.

I would like to finish this blog congratulating the Indian team on the hard fought victory in the Kanpur Test. My opinion is that we are better off producing turners than trying to produce sporting wickets. We should not make any hue and cry about the nature of wickets, instead we must concentrate on our core strength of spinners. Other countries should expect turners when they come to India. At the same time, its upto our batsmen to improve their batting in regards to playing overseas and try and bring laurels to the Indian cricket team.