What do we expect of our bowlers?

Since the beginning of the natwest series in England on August 21st, India have played 10 ODI’s now and even though one of those could not be completed because of rain (Bangalore ODI), here is a list of totals that India have conceded in those games:

Southampton: 288/2 (L)
Bristol: 320/8
Birmingham: 281/8 (L)
Manchester: 213/7 (L)
Leeds: 242/8
Oval: 316/6
Lord’s: 188 (L)
Bangalore: 307/7 (NR)
Kochi: 306/6 (L)
Hyderabad 290/7 (L)

India have conceded 280+ in 7 out of 10 games, and two of those victories have come in high scoring games (Bristol, Oval). Looking through the bowling stats of the natwest tournament, the economy rates of our pacemen in that series are shocking by any decent standard (all though not so according to conventional wisdom in India, more on that later). Here’s how they read:

Zaheer Khan 4.82, Average 67.50 runs/wicket
RP Singh 5.28, Average 31.71 runs/wicket
Agarkar: 7.11, average 44.71 runs/wicket
MM Patel: 8.23, average 26.75 runs/wicket

Coming to the three games against Australia, after the errant bowlers (the last two in the above list) had been dropped and less errant bowlers (Sreesanth, Irfan) had been picked,

Irfan Pathan 5.07, Average 35.50 runs/wicket
Zaheer Khan 6.00, Average 36.00 runs/wicket
Sreesanth 6.42, Average 22.50 runs/wicket
RP Singh 6.70, hasn’t taken a wicket

The bowlers do not seem to be able to take a wicket unless they are profligate and concede about six runs/over. The only acceptable bowling average amongst those is Zaheer Khan’s in England. And there it appears that his efforts in the Test series earned him the respect of the English batsmen – they seem to have decided to play him out.

There used to be the adage that 3/50 is better than 0/35 in 10 overs in an ODI. Both seem to be too much to expect from an Indian paceman. There is no point in blaming the spinners, because by the time they come on to bowler, the batsmen are set and the batting side is on the attack. The fifth bowler doesn’t seem to be much of a problem either – the fifth bowlers overs go for 70 in 10 overs, while the main bowlers go for anything between 55-70! Most of our pacemen cannot be relied upon to bowl an entire over of decent line and length. Batsmen never seem to have to improvise at all to take 6 an over of our bowlers. Conceding 90-100 runs in the last 10 overs seems to have become par for the course for India.

And yet, the great concern seems to be whether or not the “senior” batsmen should be in the side! If they are asked to perform miracles in every game, then they will fail more often than they will succeed. If you lined up the 6 greatest batsmen in history, it would be no different. The selectors in this case can’t do anything, because the best bowler in India – Munaf Patel, seems to be on the wrong side of public opinion (this time his fitness is not the issue). The “best” bowler in India – Sreesanth can’t seem to figure out how to bowl a good line and length. The in form bowler – RP Singh seems to get the rough end of the stick – one bad effort and he’s out of the side. Sreesanth is exasperating from the selection point of view, because amidst all his rubbish, he seems capable of producing some wicket taking gems.

It is interesting – the two best bowlers in India – Munaf Patel and Sreesanth, each have problems of temperament for which there seems to be no solution. One has drawn the rough end of public opinion and has the coach complaining about him behind his back, the other has drawn public adoration (misguided adoration in my view, detrimental to his own development), and seems to have nobody who can keep him on track! Inspite of having about 6 fast bowlers to choose from, India seem to be unable to decide a true pecking order. Venkatesh Prasad needs to explain a few things in my view.

As for the senior batsmen, not only do they face decisively superior bowling (i wonder what Dravid, Tendulkar and Yuvraj would average in Tests and ODIs if they were able to face the Indian bowling) than the opposition batsmen face, they also face ridiculously stiff targets game after game. India has lost the last 3 games (in my view they would have lost at Bangalore as well) because they do not have a clue as to how they are going to control the runs or organize their overs when they bowl.

Typically though, it is Dhoni (or Dravid before him) or the batsmen who will draw the public ire. If not them it will be the selectors or the “BCCI”. The bowlers seem untouchable. This is not surprising – for to pay attention to the bowler is to pay attention to cricket. Everybody other than the pacemen have been doing their bit – the selectors have made good selections, the BCCI has hired bowling and fielding coaches and the batsmen have had a fine year.

5 of the top 13 run getters in ODI cricket in the year 2007 are Indians. The top 15 run getters in ODI cricket for the year 2007 include 5 Indians, 3 Australians, 3 Englishmen, 2 South Africans and 2 Sri Lankans. There are only 2 Indians amongst the top 20 wicket takers in ODI cricket this year – Zaheer Khan and Ajit Agarkar.

We have come to accept 6 runs/over as a par performance from our bowlers. It is not. Even if ODI batsmen have become more aggressive, good bowlers still go for 48-50 runs in their 10 overs where they would go for 35-40 a few years ago. Out of the top 20 wicket takers in ODI cricket this year, if you leave out Zaheer Khan, Ajit Agarkar and Ryan ten doeshate of the netherlands, the other 17 bowlers have all conceded 4.7 runs/over or less.

A poor economy rate almost never means that a bowler is “aggressive” and “looking for wickets” all the time. A look at economy rates for India in 2007 is revealing. They are as follows:

In 2007 (figure in the bracket is the bowling average):

Harbhajan bowled 99 overs at 4.34 (61.42)
Ganguly bowled 53 at 4.71 (41.66)
RP Singh bowled 91 overs at 4.74 (33.23)
Zaheer Khan bowled 204 overs at 4.81 (32.80)
Munaf Patel bowled 88 overs at 4.83 (25.17)
Piyush Chawla bowled 111 overs at 4.84 (31.83)
Ajit Agarkar bowled 154 overs at 5.20 (32.08)
Sachin Tendulkar bowled 72 overs at 5.59 (44.77)
Yuvraj Singh bowled 69 overs at 5.85 (45.00)
Sreesanth bowled 84 overs at 6.08 (30.05)

Our best bowlers this year in terms of economy rate have been Harbhajan Singh, RP Singh, Zaheer Khan and Munaf Patel. All the part timers (Sehwag has gone for 4.82) have done better than Sreesanth. Zaheer and Harbhajan seem to have lost the art of taking wickets. Munaf – i’ve said enough about him already.

We can’t seem to play a steady bowling line up. Looking at the numbers above, its not hard to see why. And yet, we have a bowling coach who complains to the press about the one bowler who’s record in 2007 compares favorably with that of any of the top bowlers around the world.

Its not hard to see where the problem lies – not just with the bowling, but with our expectations from our bowling. In my view it is indicative of our skewed understanding of cricket. Anybody in an cricketing community (including our own) will tell you that quality bowlers are gold. Ian Chappell, talking about captaincy on cricinfo recently said “it helps if a captain has a couple of good bowlers”.

If the same standards that are applied to Tendulkar were applied to our bowlers, most of them wouldn’t last more than 2 months. The reason they last, is because there are no Tendulkar’s in the bowling line up. This points to a crucial point that the “give the youngsters a chance” crowd don’t seem to understand. Chances have to be earned – they can’t be handed over by default, simply to be nice to somebody. Whats happening in the bowling line up is that we are so used to mediocrity, that we don’t know what to do with genuine quality when we see it (Munaf Patel). Some of us expect him to be a tearaway quick, when the true measure of his quality lies in the fact that he was able to modify his method to being an accurate brisk medium fast bowler. Some of us are stuck up on his alleged “attitude” problem. Fitness is a different issue. It is also the most professionally dealt with issue (mainly because the public doesn’t interfere with it).

This Australian series is pretty much lost right now. A miracle might come about – but if it does, then that’s precisely what it will be – a miracle. It will not be Dhoni’s fault, it will not be the fault of the batting ….. the cause of defeat is down to conceding 300 in nearly every game. Bowling is our bogey. And it has been so for so long that we can’t even identify it anymore. We seem to prefer the madness of Sreesanth (which results in him going for 6 an over – the worst among all our bowlers – specialist or otherwise this year).

If that is all we expect of our bowlers, then lets sit back, and watch India get pummeled to the tune of 6 an over and then get ready to belittle our batsmen for not performing miracles game after game.

Magnificient Batsmen deliver yet again…..

India levelled the Natwest series 3-3 at the Oval today chasing 300+ for a record 6th time in ODI cricket. Sri Lanka with 4 successful 300+ run chases have the second best record. India have also reached 300 batting second more often than any other ODI team. While this is an indicator of India’s formidable batting strength, it is more significantly a measure of their moderate bowling. If the Australian batting were stretched for example, they might have done better than India in reaching 300.

Today’s stirring run chase was made possibly by the bowlers committing suicide yet again after doing quite well in the first 30 overs of the English innings. England were 137/5 in 30 overs and were allowed to score 179 runs in the last 20 overs despite being 5 down! Owais Shah batted brilliantly and the bowling and fielding fell away. When it was India’s turn to bat, it was the usual suspects delivering yet again. Indeed, at 139/0 after 20 overs, India might have expected to win easily. The run chase was a great example of why the 300 score is so difficult to chase. After batting brilliantly for 25 or so overs, India were still required to scored at better than 6 an overs in the last 25 overs, and a couple of wickets at the wrong time put the skids on the Indian run rate. Tendulkar batted as only Tendulkar can and it is possibly the saddest thing in cricket in many many years, that he should have to contemplate retirement from ODI cricket just as he had managed to put together his first real continuous stint of batting at the international level since the 2003 World Cup. But even if he does decide to retire, he has in this series managed to offer glimpses of his old self – he will retire as the greatest ODI batsman in history.

Sourav Ganguly seems to prosper in the great man’s company and India’s come back in this series has been due in large part to their brilliance at the top of the order. They have now produced two consecutive century stands for the first wicket in must win games. Doubtless, if they don’t make runs in the decider, they will be accused of not delivering when it really counts (never mind that the fast bowling has not deliver in any substantial measure in any of the 6 games so far), but then again, if they played to please the public, they might not have lasted a single year, let alone 18 and 11 respectively.

Robin Uthappa, Gautam Gambhir and MS Dhoni all played their parts in the run chase with Uthappa especially finding crucial boundaries at the end.

It’s on to the decider then…. with Andrew Flintoff most likely to miss out, India will fancy their chances – provided the bowling delivers…. It is time the bowlers put together 50 solid overs of bowling.

Bowling, Fielding hurts India yet again……

The Indian bowling had a third consecutive sub-par day as India went down by 45 runs to England in the third ODI of the 7 match series. India have to win 3 out of the next 4 if they are to win this series now and if the bowling and fielding keeps performing the way it has been (more the bowling than the fielding), then there is little chance of that happening. The batsmen will have to play out of even their extraordinarily proficient skins to win with the kind of bowling that India have. India have nobody who is able to control the runs and their best bowler (Munaf Patel) has developed a problem of overstepping and bowling occasional wides – something he didn’t have earlier. He bowled 4 no balls in 5 overs today to add to the 5 he bowled in 8 overs yesterday.

India have to control proceedings with the new ball especially against a scratch pairing of Cook and Prior. It is not as though it is Gilchrist, Hayden and Ponting they are up against. England have greater fast bowling depth compared to India and even without Flintoff and Sidebottom, they are able to play 3 bowlers who are quicker than all the Indian bowlers in the ODI squad barring Patel. This pace edge is further accentuated by India not bowling as well as they can bowl. The inexperienced spinners have done an admirable job inspite of having to come on to bowl with the opposition innings in excellent shape. It would be completely different if Powar could come in at 80/3 instead of 120/1.

Just as a comparison, the the 6 (or 7, depending on how many batsmen they played) India batsmen have averaged 36.83 runs/wicket in these first 3 ODI games. In comparison, the top 6 (or 7) English batsmen have averaged 45.63 runs/wicket in these games. To put this in perspective, of the top 50 run-getters in ODI history, only 3 – Bevan, Richards and Greenidge average over 45 runs/wicket with the bat. India have conceded 280+ on 3 consecutive occasions now inspite of having good times to bowl in each of the three games. If they keep this up, people are going to forget very quickly that this Indian bowling line up took 56 out of 60 English wickets on offer in the Test series!

There are limitations with some of the batsmen as well. India have still not found a quality ODI batsman to add to Dravid, Ganguly, Tendulkar and Yuvraj. I can see Sehwag returning in a hurry if things don’t improve. Due to the performance of the bowlers, they have been forced to play 5 bowlers even though none of those 5 bowlers qualify as anything other than tailenders with the bat. It puts fierce pressure on the top 5 batsmen (+Dhoni). It forces Ganguly to hold one end up as he did today instead of attacking. 280 is not chased everyday. India keep conceding it everyday though!

There needs to be a serious rethink with the bowling tactics as well as strategy. The problem with the bowling – especially the fast bowling, is even though three pace bowlers are played, if any of them are missing for a game due to injury or illness, it cannot be said that they would be missed. Out of Agarkar, Zaheer, Sreesanth, Munaf, RP Singh and Irfan Pathan, it would be impossible as of today to clearly mark a first choice pace attack. If ever there was an example of musical chairs in the Indian pace attack, it is now. There is depth in numbers and talent, but there is no consistency. These blow hot blow cold performance must drive Dravid and Vengsarkar and Venky Prasad up the wall! Contrast this with the current Indian batting line up. If you look at the 5 mainstays – Tendulkar, Ganguly, Dravid, Yuvraj and Dhoni, for just the year 2007, their record reads as follows (not counting minnow matches):

Ganguly – 540 runs at 45 in 10 innings
Tendulkar – 570 runs at 47.5 in 13 innings
Dravid – 648 runs at 58.9 in 13 innings
Yuvraj – 349 runs at 49.8 in 10 innings
Dhoni – 290 runs at 41.42 in 11 innings

Those are records any team would kill for…… Yet, India have win loss record against non-minnows in 2007 which reads 8-6.

I don’t buy the argument that India play on fast scoring grounds on easy paced tracks. India plays on the same tracks that every other side in the world plays on. You don’t see Vaas or Pollock or Ntini go for 6 or 7 runs per over in every second game. India ought not to fall into the trap of lowering expectations from the bowlers simply because they can’t meet the required high standards. They won’t win consistently with bad bowling and the batting will not bail them out every time. Besides, the batting is entitled its off days as well (much rarer than the new ball bowlers having off days!).

Theres nothing India can do about their fielding, because you can’t replace Ganguly, Dravid and Tendulkar simply because they are not Jonty Rhodes in disguise. If Munaf and co were to bowl well, India would win inspite of the fielding deficit. The best way to get some balance would be to find an all rounder. Thats why Irfan Pathan is so priceless.

The outcome of this natwest series depends on whether or not India’s new ball bowlers recover some semblance of control. If they do, India will win. If they don’t then England will. India’s beleagured bowlers will do well to remember that they have yet to face the Pietersen and Flintoff willows in full cry. When that happens they might just bottom out.