Maestro marches on

The West Indies would have to put in a tremendous performance from here to stay competitive against Team India whose openers compiled a sensible stand marked by some attractive strokes before a twin strike in three balls by spinner Shillingford undid their good work. And when they departed, they were replaced by the 'man of the match' Tendulkar who gathered his 38* with the patience of a zen master who could stay calm in the midst of a maelstrom of noise, striking six boundaries with the poise of a classical Test batsman aware of all the angles and the ability to get to the pitch of the ball.

 

Darren Sammy , would have to cop a fair bit of the criticism for a stunning 'Collapso' as Caribbean batting collapses tend to be described, tonguein-cheek. Having spoken of batsmen stepping up to the plate to take greater responsibility, he was probably guilty of the worst stroke of the day -a wild heave top-edged to speed up the collapse after the fall of Shivnarine Chanderpaul who, in his 149 Tests before this, is already the world's 'losingest' cricketer, having figured in 67 lost causes already .

 

Chanderpaul did his best, although not in his trademark style. On the contrary , he surprised his followers, who may be accustomed to seeing a dour performer who carries his side's batting on his lean shoulders, by striking the very second ball for six off India's most successful bowler of the day, Pragyan Ojha. Batting more like the electric hare on a greyhound racetrack than the proverbial snail, the Guyanese lent some perspective to the batting conditions.

 

Dhoni, in his inimitable counter-intuitive logic, had put the West Indies even though he had only two quicks in his specialist list of four bowlers in the playing XI.

 

Having spoken about the dampness after Wednesday noon's inspection, he may have been convinced even more by the greenish tinge Thursday morning.

 

The two medium fast youngsters, Md. Shami and Bhuvaneshwar Kumar, repaid their skipper's trust with some genuine swing and seam aided by bounce.

 

Shami squared Gayle up with a beauty that bounced even as it left the batsman and set up a simple catch for backward point. Kumar's away seamer to Chanderpaul was equally impressive, cutting away from leg stump to off to give tall Ashwin at first slip a simple catch with which he could redeem himself after having put down a similar one to reprieve opener Kieran Powell who went on to make the top score.

 

The spinners enjoyed all the success thanks as much to the extra bounce that the first day pitch at the Wankhede routinely provides as the West Indian propensity to commit harakiri at the crease. Ashwin, playing his 17th Test, became the fastest bowler to 100 Test wickets since Clarrie Grimmett in 1931 providing fodder along the way for Dhoni's safe and slick glove work behind the stumps. The skipper has now pas sed the 250-victim mark with 215 catches and 36 stumpings.

 

O j h a delighted in picking a fivefor, his persistent line of attack proving too tight for the visitors to shake off without a touch of madness in trying to force any odd ball they chose to attack. ball they chose to attack.

 

The batsmen seemed to disagree with a couple of the decisions but there was little in their approach to suggest they would have benefited greatly even had they been reprieved by the English umpires. The inexplicable cricket of the West Indies only lengthened with Sammy taking the new ball himself to share with Shannon Gabriel, the pair being not the most potent ones to have ever opened the attack for the West Indies.

 

Shikhar Dhawan was almost West Indian in his dismissal to a careless pull to square leg while Vijay got a while Vijay got a bouncing turner he nicked to backward short leg. The crowd may not have minded too much since they could boast that they were there when Sachin came to bat and watched the 73 balls he faced to close. All eyes are on Friday now.

 

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