India abroad…. almost the best of the rest…….

You might wonder at the outset about this title – there are other sides which have done well overseas, as much, if not more often, than India have. Consider these numbers for this decade, for away performance of all Test playing nations (not counting performances in Zimbabwe and Bangladesh). The last figure in each line are points – 1 for a win, 0.5 for a draw and 0 for a defeat.

India 9-14 in 38 Tests – 16.5
Pakistan 9-15 in 32 Tests – 13
Sri Lanka 6-15 in 27 Tests – 9
England 12-18 in 42 Tests – 18
South Africa 10-15 in 36 Tests – 15.5
Australia 24-8 in 36 Tests – 26
West Indies 1-32 in 44 Tests – 6.5
New Zealand 1-10 in 21 Tests – 8

When you consider that fast bowling is what wins Test matches overseas, it is not hard to realize the magnitude of India’s overseas achievements in this decade, coming as it does after India had not won a single Test match overseas (barring Sri Lanka in 1992) in the 1990’s. Lets have a look at the records of the major Indian players in these results (these figures are for the Test’s considered above only)

Rahul Dravid – 3352 runs at 60.95
Virendra Sehwag – 2068 runs at 49.23
VVS Laxman – 2325 runs at 48.43
Sachin Tendulkar – 2069 runs at 47.02
Sourav Ganguly – 1785 runs at 40.53

Ironically, as more and more fast bowling talent has begun to emerge, the batsmen have aged. They are still fine batsmen though – some of the finest in the world. The two bowlers who have played the large majority of those overseas Tests for India have been Anil Kumble and Zaheer Khan. Other bowlers have played important parts – Ashish Nehra, Laxmipathy Balaji, Irfan Pathan, Harbhajan Singh, Sreesanth, Munaf Patel, Ajit Agarkar, RP Singh etc.

Anil Kumble – 116 wickets at 34.87
Zaheer Khan – 91 wickets at 33.06

Comparing this with the best team in the world in Away performances

Ricky Ponting – 2408 runs at 51.23
Mathew Hayden – 2744 runs at 46.5
Justin Langer – 2377 runs at 45.71
Adam Gilchrist – 2356 runs at 49.08
Damien Martyn – 2184 runs at 49.63
Steve Waugh – 1059 runs at 54.95

Clarke, Hussey, Symonds and Lehman have all featured in the Australian middle order during this decade, as has Mark Waugh.

Australia’s batting numbers, while superior to India’s are not decisively so. Their great advantage has been Adam Gilchrist, and a world class, well settled opening pair. The quality of the Indian line up is apparent from the comparison of their numbers to those of this great Australian team. Rahul Dravid’s record overseas is probably the finest amongst all batsmen in this decade (i haven’t checked Kallis and Lara, but i don’t think they have done much better than 3000 runs at 60!).

Where then does the difference lie – the difference indicated by 24-8 as against 9-14? The answer is quite obviously the bowling. The best (i say best, because they are the most capped) Indian bowlers average 34 and 33 respectively away from home. Compare that to the following:

McGrath – 127 wickets at 19.96
Gillespie – 105 wickets at 28.05
Lee – 93 wickets at 32.87
Warne – 199 wickets at 24.00

Add Kasprowicz, Clark and MacGill to this list, and even they have done better than India’s best.

Thats the difference between India and Australia. At Lord’s India’s bowlers were lauded for keeping England under 300 in both innings, when they should probably have conceded no more than 225 in the first and probably the same number in the second (that would have meant victory at Lord’s for India). Australia would have restricted England to that score, and been 2-0 up by now. And yes – they would have probably won by an innings at Trent Bridge.

It is fitting that Dravid is captain now. He has been the finest batsman in the world in away Test in this decade – arguably the finest of all batsmen in this decade playing anywhere (all though Ponting is probably supported by a finer argument – 4335 runs at 74.74 in Australia in this decade!). India will go to the Oval looking forward to breaking yet another of their perennial bogeys – that of going off the boil in the Test after an overseas win.

Matthew Hoggard will probably return to replace James Anderson, and i suspect that England may see if they can rush Andrew Flintoff back in time for the Oval Test now that they are behind.

India go to the Oval as equal, as slight favorites even. As Rahul Dravid said after the Trent Bridge win – “I think expectations have increased over the last four or five years,and people don’t expect us to just come here and be part of the summer. People do expect us to come and perform and we expect ourselves to come here and perform. We don’t come here just to be another team.”

The numbers suggest he has played the telling hand in this transformation. But he has had a quiet time overseas in recent months. Five years ago, he confirmed his membership of the great players club with a double hundred at the Oval. Might we see an encore from the great man?

Batting in difficult conditions – has it really been India’s weakness?

One hears this argument all the time – that India struggle on the bouncy, seaming wickets outside the subcontinent, simply because the batsmen don’t put up enough runs and don’t deliver under pressure. Now, especially in Test cricket, this is not the case. The table below provides a comparison of the runs/wicket scored (S) and conceded (C) by each of the top 8 Test teams in Australia, England, New Zealand, South Africa and West Indies since the year 1990. It shows that India have had one of the better batting line ups in world cricket in those conditions in this period. India have the best runs/wicket record in Australia, England and the West Indies, have reasonable records in New Zealand and South Africa.

What the record reveals more starkly is the poor Indian bowling performances in these nations. They have the worst bowling record bar Sri Lanka or Pakistan (only in SA, elsewhere their record is superb) in each of the 5 countries.

So, it is not the batting which has hurt India overseas, but the lack of fast bowling. The batting has consistently been amongst the best in the world. The story has always been, that in 250 all out conditions, India inevitably ended up conceded 350-400, and in good batting conditions, India always conceded 500+. That left the batsmen with a basically un-winnable situation in almost every test match.

What this line up – with 3 decent pace bowlers (who are at least competitive) in the current team and in recent teams (especially this decade, when India have won 5 Tests in the countries mentioned above, while losing 7), has given India, is the ability to compete on somewhat equal terms with the opposition.

With any other bowling line up, the batting line up available to India in the last 16 years would have featured in many more test wins. That is what has changed this decade.

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Victory at Johannesburg – South Africa’s 14th defeat at home in 14 years.

If you look at Home test performances, then barring Australia, South Africa have been the most difficult side to beat at home. Of the 13 Test defeats South Africa have had in South Africa since 1992, 8 have come against the Australians, while 3 have come against England (and one of those was Hansie Cronje’s quixotic declaration in exchange for a leather jacket and some money!). New Zealand (left arm spinner Hart and pace man Simon Doull bowling out South Africa twice) and Pakistan (fired by Shoaib Akthar) have been the other two victors.

We can now add India to that list. 🙂 🙂 🙂

I don’t want to say the usual “i told you so” line (mainly because i didn’t tell you so in so many words), but in my post at the end of the first day’s play, with India 156/5, i said

“I sense good things for India in this test match, especially if the bowlers don’t get carried away and test the middle of the pitch all the time (something that Sreesanth and VRV are prone to do)”

I have now successfully predicted 2 of India’s most famous overseas wins – on the other occasion, at Adelaide, on the third evening i had said the following (i don’t have the link, because i said it on a cricket forum)…. “if India can get within 30-40 runs of the Australian score, and then get the Australian top 3 (Hayden, Langer and Ponting) before the Australian score reaches 50, then a 230 run 4th innings chase is gettable”. As it turned out, from 7/477, India reached 523 all out, conceding a lead of 35 runs, after which Langer, Ponting and Hayden were all dismissed early to leave Australia 3/44. Australia went on to get bowled out for 196, leaving India exactly 230 to win, which they achieve with 4 wickets to spare.

As you can see, my predictions have become less glorious with time. But India have been just as glorious at Johannesburg in 2006, as they were at Adelaide in 2003. India have now won 2 consecutive overseas Test matches for the first time in 20 years (Jamaica and Johannesburg). Previously, they won at Wellington and Auckland in 1967-68, at Melbourne and Sydney in 1977-78, and finally they won at Lord’s and Headingley in 1986. I don’t count their wins against Zimbabwe last season at Bulawayo and Harare. The Durban Test offers India the chance to win 3 overseas Tests in a row for the first time. The return of Munaf Patel should help them – the one weak link in the bowling line up – VRV Singh will make way for him. Irfan will have to sit out again. In this decade, India now have a 14-13 win-loss record in overseas Tests (4 of these results have come against weak opposition – 1 in Bangladesh and 3 in Zimbabwe). These are the records of some of Indias lynchpins in those victories:

Sachin Tendulkar
10 matches, 1013 runs, 92.09 average, 4 centuries, 1 fifties

Rahul Dravid
14 matches, 1552 runs, 86.22 average, 4 centuries, 7 fifties

VVS Laxman
12 matches, 819 runs, 51.08 average, 2 centuries, 4 fifties

Sourav Ganguly
12 matches, 876 runs, 67.38 average, 2 centuries, 7 fifties

Virendra Sehwag
10 matches, 577 runs, 44.38 average, 1 century, 0 fifties

Anil Kumble
10 matches 52 wickets, 21.32 average, 3 5 wicket hauls, 0 10 wicket hauls

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