The tall-talking Indian captain Sourav Ganguly and the team’s coolheaded coach John Wright on Tuesday differed on the causes for India’stame defeat in the second cricket Test against Zimbabwe in Harare onMonday
19-Jun-2001The tall-talking Indian captain Sourav Ganguly and the team’s coolheaded coach John Wright on Tuesday differed on the causes for India’stame defeat in the second cricket Test against Zimbabwe in Harare onMonday.A dismal failure with the bat – he has aggregated just 49 runs in thelast seven Test innings – Ganguly blamed his batsmen for the defeat.As for the bowlers, “they did not bowl badly,” he said.Wright, a former New Zealand captain, however, had tough words forboth batsmen and bowlers from whom he expected greater discipline.Analysing India’s defeat which enabled the home side to level theseries 1-1, Wright said the Indian batsmen must have the disciplineand the ability to graft. “We must produce at least 300 runs onwickets that seam,” he said.”I think from the batting perspective, there are certain shots whichare more difficult to play in conditions such as here. We have toadjust in places where the ball moves around a bit,” he said.India made just 237 and 234 batting first and most of its top orderbatsmen were out chasing deliveries outside the off-stump. “That to meis the stand-out reason. You have to occupy the crease a little moreand rein in some of your attacking instincts,” the coach said.Ganguly conceded that his team lost the game in the first hour of thefourth morning. “You can’t lose seven wickets for 37 runs and expectto win. It was poor batting from top to number eleven,” he said.About his own inglorious role in the defeat, the skipper said “therewas a game plan for me to see off the new ball. I am a regular. It wasmy responsibility to see the new ball (off) and then hope thetailenders would do well later”.Wright was critical of the medium-pacers and the kind of line andlength they maintained in the series. “We bowled too short. I thinkour medium-pacers have to learn to make the batsmen commit more on thefront foot and bowl the off-stump line,” he said adding that currentlyIndia was not exactly overflowing with its bowling resources.”If you look at the two bowling sides, the Zimbabwe attack was goodenough to dismiss the Indian batting line up which, on paper, looksvery strong. I can’t see any reason why our bowlers can’t do thesame,” the coach said.Ganguly, however, didn’t blame his bowlers. “I don’t think our bowlersbowled badly. Even the way we fought to defend 157 was heartening. Ifwe had stretched the target to 225, it would have been a differentball game altogether,” he said.The skipper praised seamer Ashish Nehra and off spinner HarbhajanSingh for their bowling in the series. “Nehra bowled fantastically. Hewas our main bowler. We just didn’t have enough runs on the board (forhim) to win us the game,” Ganguly said and added “as for Harbhajan, ahaul of 32 wickets on these pitches was not possible. But still he dida good job. He didn’t go for many runs and tied up one end”.Though lamenting the lack of bowling resources, Wright conceded thatthe bowlers did “a great job” and said “they were not the reason whythis Test match was lost”.The coach said “I think we do lack quality bowlers but we have to workhard. We got to use our resources as best as we can. Having said that,I am very encouraged by the performance of Ashish Nehra. He has donebrilliantly on this tour. He seems to move the ball and has a verynatural talent”.Wright complimented Zimbabwe for the way they won the Test with adepleted attack and especially when one-down in the series. He saidtheir bowlers gave a very good exhibition on the final morning,attacking the stumps with the new ball.Turning to individual performances of the Indian players, Wright, whenasked whether it was a tactical mistake to have included Ajit Agarkarin place of Zaheer Khan, replied “Zaheer possibly was unlucky to missthis Test”.On the strange decision of including Hemang Badani to open the inningsbut sending in Sameer Dighe as Shiv Sundar Das’ partner, Wright said”It is one of the problems (you face) when you tour abroad with onlytwo specialist openers. If someone gets injured, you have got to tryout someone (else). In retrospect, I would take the responsibility forthe situation. I thought Dighe would do a good job there”.Asked why Rahul Dravid, who has a better technique against the newball bowlers, was not asked to open the innings, Wright said the vicecaptain was more comfortable batting lower down the order.”We have to find someone who wants to open the batting. I thinkselecting Dravid would be a short term and not a long term prospect,”Wright said. “Rahul is averaging 54 in Test cricket. He has opened ona couple of ocassions and hasn’t done too brilliantly. The figureswould suggest so. I feel, for Rahul we need to be looking at numberfive or six,” he said.The coach was very disappointed with the missed opportunity ofclaiming a rare series victory abroad. “I think we missed a goodopportunity here. I feel very disappointed for cricket fans in India.They would have enjoyed the first series victory in 15 years,” hesaid.