da leao： Winless in the series so far, a young but talented Indian side willhave to get their act together when they take on New Zealand in theirthird league match of the Coca-Cola Cup tri-series in Colombo onThursday to stay in the reckoning for the final
25-Jul-2001Winless in the series so far, a young but talented Indian side willhave to get their act together when they take on New Zealand in theirthird league match of the Coca-Cola Cup tri-series in Colombo onThursday to stay in the reckoning for the final.With Sri Lanka winning their match against New Zealand by five wicketstoday, India’s cause has been helped and they must now win at leasttwo of the remaining four league matches to hope for a place in thefinal. The hosts, with three consecutive victories under their beltand six points are almost assured of a final slot ahead of New Zealandwho have two points.”It is a do or die situation,” Indian skipper Sourav Ganguly summed itup aptly on the eve of the crucial match.Coach John Wright confirmed that Ajit Agarkar and Debasish Mohantyhave been ruled out and named the same 13 that lost to Sri Lanka bysix runs in the previous outing for tomorrow’s match.Losing their opening encounter against New Zealand by a huge margin of84 runs and then fumbling at the winning post by six runs against SriLanka in the next, India have been quite unpredictable which makesweighing their chances a dicey proposition.The bowlers have done a commendable job, sticking to a tidy line andlength but the batsmen have been a huge disappointment, gifting awaytheir wickets to unnecessary shots or being unable to rotate thestrike in crunch situations.It defied reason to see a batsman of the calibre of Rahul Dravidstruggling to get a boundary off even a full toss when India needed 12runs in the last over for a win.India’s case has been one of a huge gap between potential andperformance so far and the coach and the skipper must do a bit ofsoul-searching to find match-winning solutions before it is too late.Ganguly is finally among the runs and there is no reason why he shoulddemote himself down the order. He should not repeat the mistake hemade in the previous match against Sri Lanka, promoting HarbhajanSingh ahead of himself only to see the plan backfire.With all-rounders like Yuvraj Singh, Hemang Badani, Virender Sehwagand Reetinder Singh Sodhi in their ranks, the Indians must open withGanguly and Amay Khurasiya for a solid start to the innings.The task for the Indian batsmen has been made tough by the absence oftheir mainstay Sachin Tendulkar but India must get over their overdependence on the maestro and play as a well-knit team.The participating teams have shrugged off threats from LTTE guerillasand looked largely unaffected by the politically volatile situation asthey have continued with their regular practice and scotched rumoursof scrapping off the series midway.