Crap-e diem - part deux

Blessed are the meek
for they shall inherit the earth.
- Matthew 5:5

(My previous Crap-e diem post can be read by clicking here).

At the drinks break after the first hour of play in the Bangladesh-England Test match, the hosts were at a mind-boggling 95 for 1, chiefly because of Tamim Iqbal, who had scythed his way to 74 runs in just 48 balls, with 13 fours and a six.

Read that again: 95 for 1 in 14 overs, Tamim on 74, 13 fours, 1 six.

Graeme Swann and James Tredwell were bowling with 5 men on the fence and no close-in fielders. The sound you did not hear was the distinct lack of chirping from the fielders when Tamim was at the crease. In the next 21 balls he faced, Tamim scored 3 two's and 5 singles. However the shot he chose for many of those was the sweep, always a trickier shot to an off-spinner (for a left-hander, as Tamim is). By then Tamim looked like a fellow who was going to nurdle his way to a 100. He was done in by a dodgy umpiring decision but that does not take away from the fact that he let matters reach a point where his continued presence at the crease was in someone else's hands.

Let's step away for a minute and go across the globe to the Australia-New Zealand Test series. Australia had declared shortly after crossing 450. The Kiwi batsmen inspire no confidence in their captain and once again showed why, quickly falling to 31 for 3, with Ross Taylor and Martin Guptill at the crease. Taylor is a fellow more in the Sehwagian than the Dravidian mold of batting and, initially, was looking for runs, reaching 20 in 24 balls. Guptill is an enigma. I have seen the fellow sock the leather off the ball and also treat it with the reverence associated with grenades lacking a pin, so it was a question of which batsman would show up. The grenade-fearing one showed up and New Zealand was temporarily doomed.

Over in Bangladesh, Junaid Siddiqui began with three quick fours and then settled into a defensive mode against the debutant Tredwell. I had two windows going on my laptop, watching with fascination as two battles were being waged across the globe.

In both of them a familiar pattern emerged. One that every Indian has noticed all too distressingly often. The batsmen settled into a groove where they did not even look to score runs, survival being uppermost on their minds. It is about the only faulty thing that Sachin Tendulkar does these days with the bat, it seems. Fielders and bowlers, who had one eye on the scoreboard and the other on the long day ahead of them, slowly regained their voices knowing fully well that even if they made small mistakes the mindset of the batsmen would not be such that it could prove to be too expensive.

It is at times like this I wonder why the standard reaction for the underdog teams is to muscle-clench their way into a submissive position when the initiative is there to be seized.

Taylor scored one more run in the next 18 balls he faced, fatally edging one to third slip where Marcus North took a sharp catch, diving away to his right. Mr Ross Taylor, I have watched Ricky Ponting for years. I promise you this. If you had played in a one-day style, looking for the singles that were on offer, Mr. Ponting would NOT have kept that third slip in place for long, and you would have been the beneficiary of a streaky boundary, at worst. By batting as if you were practicing your defensive repertoire you accorded the Aussie captain the luxury of retaining an 8-1 field with only mid-ff being far enough away from the bat to not qualify as a catching position. Uff!

Guptill ended the day on a Tavare-esque 19 off 94 balls, which translates to 108 runs in a full day's play (if he were the only batsman and was able to bat from both ends...but you get the point). Yes, Martin, the pitch was such a minefield and the bowling so dangerous that your captain, Daniel Vettori, was able to somehow grind his way to just 42 runs in 66 balls. Phew! Thank goodness for that.

Bangladesh was 114 for 1 in 16 overs. In the remaining 78 overs they scored 216 runs losing 7 more wickets for a deceptively respectable looking 330 for 8.

New Zealand finished the day at 108 for 4, still 152 runs from avoiding the follow-on.

My point to all this? I am not saying that the batsmen need to throw caution to the winds and slug their way out of trouble. What I am saying is that an intent to score runs is just as important to scoring them. In both matches, the ball wasn't doing anything prodigiously off the pitch or in the air. But it appeared to be in the minds of the batsmen. When Sehwag rushes through with his flurry of boundaries at the start and the field spreads, he still motors along at a run-a-ball playing straight-batted shots and ambling the singles. The dude is content to keep collecting runs that way until the field starts to creep back in and then he re-launches. It is this cat-and-mouse ability of his that puts the fear of all things holy (and unholy) into opposing captains. THAT is what I advocate.

As a batsman, your job is to always look to score runs. On some days, you may have to defend your way out of a jam, but not in a pre-determined manner. If you see a chance at a run, you take it.

Tomorrow, the two batting sides will renew their acquaintances with the bowlers. I just hope they treat them with the respect they deserve rather than the respect the batsmen feel they should deserve. The meek may very well inherit the earth, but not any time soon, judging on current evidence.