On a pitch where most of the batsmen struggled to play their strokes, Sachin Tendulkar showed consummate skill in his knock of 86. He started off circumspectly – his first 30 deliveries fetched him just seven runs – but after lunch, he was a different batsman. In the 109 balls he played after the break, he scored 79 runs – that's a scoring-rate of more than four runs an over. He saved his best for West Indies' premier bowler, Mervyn Dillon, scoring 28 runs from 30 balls in that session. In his entire innings, Tendulkar scored at a strike-rate of 77% against Dillon; against the rest of the seamers, the corresponding figure was 53%.

The key to Tendulkar's dominance was his ability to make the short balls count. He scored at a-run-a-ball off the 49 such deliveries he played. His back-foot play was immaculate – 60 from 77 balls. Tendulkar was fairly cautious against deliveries outside off, scoring just 54 from 110 such balls, but when they were within striking range on the off side, he was murderous, making 26 from just 19 balls on off stump.

With West Indies bowling a whopping 93% to him on or around the off stump, it was hardly surprising that Tendulkar got 50 runs on that side of the wicket. Thirty-eight of those runs came in the arc between backward point and extra-cover. An excellent innings, but it fell well short of what India needed.

S Rajesh is sub editor of Wisden.com in India.

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