The cavaliers outdo the roundheads

By Noel Rogers

Two of India's brightest cricketing stars shone brilliantly at Kanpur on Monday, and neither the umpires nor the English opposition had the temerity to extinguish them.

Were Sachin Tendulkar and Virender Sehwag out almost before they started their assault? After 15 replays shown, I reckon that Tendulkar did tickle the ball through to Marcus Trescothick; after 15 fewer replays for Sehwag, I am sure that he was plumb leg-before-wicket. But the umpires did us all a favour by deciding otherwise.

The scripting and casting got it just right, with a succession of ordinary bowlers feeding top-of-the-bill performers with regular deliveries without threatening their star billing. No Englishman tried to steal the show from the two stars with gratuitous verbal aggression, for which the fans must give much thanks, especially after Chennai. Nor did any English player capitalise on a decent batting start or a total that gave an outside chance of victory over an Indian side mired in an awkward transitional stage. Decent county players like Ben Hollioake, Jeremy Snape and (at least in his present form) Nasser Hussain may be expected to perform well for their domestic sides, but that is rarely enough in the international arena.

The Indian batsmen, therefore, performed like cavaliers, and England accordingly took on the opposing role of the roundheads, some even with authentic haircuts. The visitors may sometimes make valid points when they go on about the umpiring, practice facilities, the hectic travelling, the additional match or their idea of a winning score. So too did Oliver Cromwell's crew, but they were not much fun either! King Charles ended up losing his head, so Sourav Ganguly should be looking over his shoulder while he still can, even though history shows the more charismatic outfit coming out on top after a period of reconstruction.

India's problem now is less about finding the players than harnessing their abundant talent into a truly formidable unit. With a fit Rahul Dravid and a sidelined VVS Laxman back in the side and in form, India have the batting to frighten the most courageous. An attack containing Javagal Srinath, Anil Kumble and Harbhajan Singh is also quite capable of taking the fight to the opposition.

It is all very depressing for an English supporter if you take the view that winning is everything and every game has been there for the taking. In England's case, it gets even more confusing, for these one-day games are being touted as just dress rehearsals for the next World Cup, not full-scale performances in their own right.

If India got the better of the Green Park umpiring decisions, their players deserved it for their positive approach, and their supporters deserved it for their overwhelming loyalty to the side throughout this series. England say that they are in India to learn. What they learned today, and not for the first time, was that there is no substitute for star quality, whether enduring or emergent, and that the cricketing gods sometimes favour romantic adventurers above the merely dourly committed.

The views expressed above are solely those of the guest contributor and are carried as written, with only minor editing for grammar, to preserve the original voice. These contributed columns are solely personal opinion pieces and reflect only the feelings of the guest contributor. Their being published on CricInfo.com does not amount to an endorsement by CricInfo's editorial staff of the opinions expressed.
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