Supreme Bowling: 100 Great Test Performances by Patrick Ferriday

Author:Patrick Ferriday
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Publisher: Von Krumm Publishing
Published: 2016-11-02T18:30:00+00:00

Ishant Sharma – 23-6-74-7

England v India, Lord’s 17-21 July 2014

-Patrick Ferriday-

Edgbaston, August 2011. India already twice thumped and, with the exception of Rahul Dravid, their batsmen looking weary, uninterested and overfaced in a toxic triad. The solution? Bring back Virender Sehwag, the most destructive Test opener of his era (and maybe any other). The problem in this simple solution was that Sehwag had been out of first-class cricket for seven months. An operation in 2009 had failed to cure the problem and by early 2011 it was clear another was required.

What to do? An immediate procedure would rule out the IPL and commitments to the Delhi Daredevils. A delay until after the IPL would rule out some, if not all, of the English Test series starting in July. What, indeed, to do?

Playing through the pain Sehwag produced two masterful T20 innings before his shoulder cried ‘enough’ and the surgeon was ordered. After two months rehabilitation and 30 minutes ‘in the middle’ in a non first-class match at Northampton he was back. His golden pair at Edgbaston illustrated how physically and mentally unready he was for such a test.

Sehwag, and those with a vested interest, had opted for IPL over Test cricket for India in the clearest possible manner. It was inevitable that such a clear-cut choice would arise as the tentacles of T20 and a pay-per-play philosophy began to wrap themselves around the revered old oak of Test cricket. It would be hard to blame Sehwag – his best Test days were past but he was still to be feared in the shortest form and for that reason he would be handsomely rewarded.

As each year passed since its inception the IPL had become more entrenched and its little brothers started to sprout their wings all around the world. The pressure increased on the big-hitting stars to prioritise. In most cases T20 won. And since this time battle has raged in boardrooms and the media from Mike Jakeman’s Saving the Test to Kimber and Collins’ Death of a Gentleman. The primary question being: can Test cricket exist alongside T20? At the heart of this question are the two countries that seem to be at the opposite ends of the spectrum, India and England.

Hence when India arrived in England for a five-Test series in 2014 it was, inevitably, on the back of an arduous series of IPL games – 60 matches in 48 days, the first 20 of which were played in the UAE before switching to India for the latter stages. The majority of the side had done their fair share of thrashing or being thrashed – Ravindra Jadeja 16 times, MS Dhoni 15, Virat Kohli 14, Shikar Dawan 14, Buvneshawar Kumar 14 and so forth. As in 2011 the preparation was, by necessity, perfunctory. Two non first-class games and then, after less than two weeks in England, straight off to Nottingham for the first of five Tests. Nothing had been learnt from 2011, or if it had then nobody actually cared enough to do anything about it.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.