Before the series began, Virender Sehwag stated that the Bangladeshi team did not have the firepower to take out 20 Indian wickets in a Test match. The Woofing Gods sat up and took note when he said this. They agreed it was true so something had to be done.
By the time the first Test finished, the bulwark of the middle order, VVS Laxman was out of the team. The Indians foxed the Gods by bringing in MS Dhoni and Murali Vijay. But the Gods did not get to float on clouds in the sky by simply sitting back when attacked. They responded by getting Rahul Dravid to duck into a bouncer that did not rise, caused Yuvraj Singh to rupture a tendon and got Sachin Tendulkar to take a tumble in the field while attempting a catch. Take that, mere mortals!
Suddenly, the Bangladeshis need to take just 8 wickets to win a Test if they get a lead. Of the 8 wickets, the trio of Pragryan Ojha, Zaheer Khan, and Ishant Sharma do not inspire confidence that they can last long. So that means they need to prise out 5 wickets. Ooooh, this gets easier now.
Bangladesh is 83 runs behind with 7 wickets in hand. They made a massive blunder yesterday by sending in a nightwatchman. Mahmudullah bats too low as it is, now he will be batting with one fewer tailender as a buffer. It is bound to play on his mind. There's only so many times a team can drink from that well.
All in all, a very intriguing two days lie ahead of us. My suspicion is that Bangladesh will take a lead, but not one that is too substantial. India has Gambhir, Sehwag, Vijay (promoted to #3), Tendulkar, and Dhoni to get those runs. It is time for Sehwag to put his bat where his mouth is and ensure that the task does not even reach Dhoni.
Maybe overcoming this adversity will appease the Gods...for now.
P.S. Quick math should tell you how hard it will be for Bangladesh to set India a target of more than 200. Trailing by 83, they need to score 300 runs to set a target of 213. Tamim Iqbal and Junaid Siddiqui put on 200 runs yesterday and it was the first ever 200-run partnership in Bangladesh's rich Test history. In a given day they will have to bat about 85 overs (a combination of bad light and MS Dhoni's typically languid pace of going through overs) and that would get them close to that 300 mark.
My gut feeling? Based on what I have seen so far, India will wrap up the win late on the 4th day or early on the 5th.
4 comments:
If rumors of Sehwag fomenting dissension in the ranks is true, he needs to be sat down from the team as a disciplinary measure for the entire South Africa series.
If that peeves him off, tough luck. India can ill-afford to weaken the skipper.
What are you talking about? I don't see anything on CricInfo. Links?
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/sports/cricket/series-tournaments/india-in-bangladesh-2010/top-stories/Team-composition-Amit-Mishra-dropping-raises-eyebrows/articleshow/5496285.cms
Okay, thanks for the link. I read that. Other than innuendo is there anything else concrete? Even the team sources for TOI claim nothing is wrong. Further, this whole article is a twice removed from the source. The guy who wrote this article is quoting an unnamed TV channel that references unnamed sources within the team.
Even in the article there is no direct reference or quote attributed to Dhoni or Sehwag.
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