Friday, December 07, 2007

Bangalore Jinx comes back to Haunt Indian Team

Yours truely had written earlier about India might have left a golden chance of wrapping the series in Kolkata slip.

"That series in 2004-05 has several parallels to this one. India had dominated for the majority of the first two Tests. In Mohali, Pakistan ended the fourth day with a lead of 53 with only four second-innings wickets in hand. Akmal and Razzaq, who had begun batting on the previous evening, played nearly the whole of the fifth day to save the Test. However, in the next match in Kolkata, Pakistan conceded a slender first-innings lead despite hundreds from Younis and Mohammad Yousuf and were dismissed for 226 chasing 422 in the final innings to give India a 1-0 lead. "

The article by George Binoy at Cricinfo - India beware the Bangalore jinx clearly underlines the same story

At the sametime, Indian team seems to be down with the same 'non-fit' bug that infected Pakistani team in Kolkata. With Zaheer, Tendulkar & Dhoni the doubtful starters for the match, Indian bowling & batting put up a depleted look.

"The irony is that Pakistan was in a similar position ahead of the second Test in Kolkata. Their captain Shoaib Malik had twisted his ankle, Umar Gul flew home with a back injury and Shoaib Akhtar and Mohammad Sami were unwell. However, barring Malik, they have no injury worries at the moment. India, on the other hand, have had to call up Gautam Gambhir on the eve of the match as cover for Tendulkar, who did not practice on Thursday but had a light training session on Friday. "

Read up the article at Cricinfo

As things look India have their backs to the wall even before the start of the TEST match.

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