The South African cricket team, which rushed to the pitch after arriving at the Ferozeshah Kotla here on Tuesday for a practice session, hoped that the fourth and final Test against India would last more than three days, says a report in The Hindu.
The South African batsmen have struggled against the Indian spinners in the series so far. The International Cricket Council (ICC) termed the spinner-friendly track in Nagpur ‘poor’ after the third Test at the VCA Stadium got over inside three days. However, South Africa’s assistant coach Adrian Birrell said his team expected turn from the pitches in India. “We are not complaining at all. We are playing in Indian conditions,” said Birrell.
According to a report in The Indian Express the South African team seemed a bit relieved following a look of the Kotla strip, with assistant coach Adrian Birrell saying that it could “last more than three days”. Having already lost the four-Test series 0-2 with first and third matches getting over within three days, and second game being washed out, South Africa will play for pride here in the fourth and last Test, commencing on Thursday.
“We have had a look at the pitch. We are playing in India and we expect pitches to turn. This one looks like to go on for more than three days. We are happy with what we saw. Like every other pitch, we are happy to play on what we are provided with. But we have not played good cricket yet, so we are determined to put up a good performance,” Birrell, a former chief coach of the Ireland national team, said.
Meanwhile, Harsha Bhogle writes in The Indian Express that fifty and twenty overs cricket have their own thrill, but most days it is like the tiger and the deer. He adds that the deer’s success lies in evading the tiger not butting him with those pretty horns. “As I have often said, it is a different skill but one that could lull batsmen into thinking that is the way of the world. It is, in the jungle, but when cricket is played in three forms, the bowler always has Test cricket for his moment in the sun. And I wonder, and to be fair it is a debate that is rightfully taking place, if the batsmen have lost their survival instinct through never having to defend their way out of adversity. It can last an hour (as Sunil Gavaskar famously used to say: Give the first hour to the bowlers and take the next five from them……not a bad investment idea!) or it could last a session or a day. But you survive to see the calm only if you weather the storm,” writes Bhogle.
He further adds that in batting as in life itself, defence is paramount. “It was defence, and denial outside the off stump, that paved the way for Murali Vijay’s return to top cricket. And it was a reminder that he could defend that took Kevin Pietersen away from the naivete and batting horror of Ahmedabad to the thrilling exhibition of batsmanship in Mumbai in 2012. Defending, and nurturing the skill to defend, is being undermined by the easy runs available on the flat pitches of limited overs cricket. It is something that even a mighty modern great like AB de Villiers has struggled with,” he says.
