Agarkar had also bagged six wickets at the MCG in January 2004, but India lost 6 for 13 and the match. Fifteen years later, they found themselves at the right end of the result

Daniel Brettig at the MCG18-Jan-20194:04

Hodge: Chahal’s consistency, self-belief work for him

In 622 ODIs played in Australia since the very first took place at the MCG in 1970-71, no-one has ever bettered the bowling figures of 6 for 42 claimed by Yuzvendra Chahal for India against Australia on January 18, 2019. He now shares that lofty perch with another Indian, Ajit Agarkar, who plucked his one haul of same at the MCG in January 2004.That night, 15 years ago, Agarkar had reason to believe for most of its journey that his efforts would deliver India the win, only to find himself part of a rush of wickets at the end, 6 for 13 in all, that slid the visitors from victors to vanquished in the space of 19 frenzied balls.Yuzvendra Chahal claimed his career-best figures•ESPNcricinfo LtdThis time, however, Chahal was not to be required with the bat, as MS Dhoni and Kedar Jadhav teased, tested and ultimately tormented Australia with a perfectly modulated chase for 231 that delivered India the series with four balls to spare.That Dhoni in particular was able to dawdle at times, very nearly blocking out a maiden from Adam Zampa’s 10th over, can be put down largely to the quality displayed by Chahal, who with his variations of spin, line and pace found exactly the right sort of wristspin for an MCG surface that in its modicum of tacky moisture offered him just enough assistance.ALSO READ: Dhoni, Jadhav clinch series win in tight chaseAt the same time it was a performance all the more remarkable for the fact that this was Chahal’s first match of the tour; by virtue of his surprise, his performance mirrored that of Kuldeep Yadav against Australia in the decisive Test match of the 2017 Test series in India. Ironically, it was Virat Kohli’s sense that the Australians were now reading Kuldeep better than in the past that compelled him to change up his spin battery.”Our strength as a side has been upredictability,” Kohli said. “We haven’t been predictable with our combinations in the past couple of years. So felt like they were reading Kuldeep quite well and they were able to score singles easily, picking his variations from the hand quite well, so we thought it might not be a bad thing to bring in Chahal for variation. Also because we were bringing in Kedar [Jadhav] who’s an offspinner and gives us an option against left-handers.”Credit has to go to him [Chahal] because the way he bowled in his first game of the tour was absolutely outstanding. To take six wickets at the MCG is no small feat for a spinner, and I’m really happy for him. He’s a very intelligent bowler and he gets us those breakthroughs. Him and Kuldeep together are definitely a force to be reckoned with and if they play together it’s our most potent spin bowling attack, but just for the balance of the team, Kuldeep had to make way for Chahal this evening.”All spin bowlers will have days where they are grateful for an early wicket, whether intentional or otherwise. For Shane Warne, of course, his first ball dismissal of Mike Gatting in England in 1993 came through a combination of vicious spin and fortunate happenstance; for Chahal, his second delivery brought impatience and inattention from Shaun Marsh, who advanced at a ball fired down the leg side and swatted at thin air before being stumped.Three balls later, and Chahal’s first delivery to Usman Khawaja arrived on a similar line, this time stopping in the pitch enough to turn the batsman’s attempted work to the leg side into a gentle leading edge and a return catch. Whatever was to follow, that double-blow when Marsh and Khawaja had appeared well set told a large part of the evening’s tale.This is not to say that Chahal did not make more vital incisions. With each delivery his rhythm improved, perhaps peaking with a legbreak to Marcus Stoinis that with drift and angle drew the batsman to shape towards the leg side, then with enough snap back across the body to draw the edge to slip, where Rohit Sharma held a terrific catch. Jhye Richardson was also confounded by drift and turn, offering a front edge to midwicket, before Peter Handscomb’s otherwise productive stay was ended by some skid off the surface when he misjudged length and was pinned lbw.”Chahal bowled beautifully today and he would have troubled anyone on that pitch,” Kohli said. “Even our team he would have troubled if we’d batted against him because he was bowling so well.”When Zampa, Chahal’s opposite number, failed to reach the pitch of the ball and lofted to long on, Chahal had six wickets and the adulation of a largely Indian crowd of 53,603. Rightfully, he pouched the Man-of-the-Match award, as Dhoni claimed the series prize. “The wicket was a little bit turning and so I could plan to bowl a little bit slower and I did my best,” Chahal said at the presentation.Startling as Chahal’s performance was, he still has work ahead of him to secure a spot in India’s World Cup plans. Kuldeep and Ravinda Jadeja are among many and varied options for India’s management, and it remains to be seen whether Chahal can transcend the conditions-based selection he clearly was on this day. But in conjuring figures that put him right at the top of a long list of accomplished bowlers to play ODIs in Australia, he had made a mark that will be difficult to forget.”If you see their performances how can you not,” Kohli said when asked whether Chahal and Kuldeep could both fit into the World Cup squad. “Two wristspinners who are getting you wickets in the middle overs. That’s the game-changer, if he didn’t get us wickets in the middle overs we would have been chasing 260-270. In one-day cricket you have to take take wickets there, and any captain would want that.”

Out of position, out of sorts, and seemingly out of his depth – every questionable call made by the team management was distilled into one brief and forgettable innings

Danyal Rasool in Cape Town05-Jan-2019It generally pays for a team to know who will open the batting in South Africa without relying on the chronic injury of one player to throw up a convenient candidate. It’s usually helpful if the specialist opener’s technique isn’t so questionable, his confidence so shot, that he’s shunted down the order to number six, a position he’s only batted at once before in international cricket, in a T20I nearly two years ago.It’s often advantageous, when the bowlers are tiring, their pace dropping and the new ball approaching, to have a legitimate fifth option instead of two part-timers with three Test wickets between them. It’s generally why, if it’s at all possible and they’re not called Pakistan, that teams do these things.This was a day on which the excuses Pakistan had made for their decisions rang hollow even to them. Fakhar Zaman is a fantastically exciting prospect for Pakistan, albeit in other formats, and preferably in the other hemisphere. Picking him as the first-choice opener on this tour, on the basis of a debut in Abu Dhabi, was an iffy selection; it wasn’t too hard to foresee that he might find himself ill-equipped to handle the pace and bounce of these pitches and the stupendously good South African seam attack.In the build-up to this series, coach Mickey Arthur had emphasised that this tour would be the true test of Pakistan’s development, and said he “reckoned we could do well”. For all that, they have ended up looking ill-prepared for this examination.A day after Arthur said he was reluctant to pick Faheem Ashraf because he wasn’t yet an allrounder, just a bowler who could bat a bit, Fakhar was sent to bat at six, one spot away from where Faheem might have batted. It is hard to imagine he would have struggled more.Fakhar was given every possible advantage a batsman might need in these conditions. He came in with the shine well and truly off the ball. in the 46th over. Asad Shafiq and Shan Masood had tired an all-pace attack out for much of a warm afternoon. Kagiso Rabada’s pace had dropped slightly in the preceding hour. And yet, off just the eighth ball Fakhar faced at number six in South Africa, he swung hopefully towards midwicket. If his feet moved, you could be forgiven for having missed it. The ball looped high in the air, almost inevitably, and Rabada completed a simple caught-and-bowled.Shan Masood played a watchful innings•Associated PressThe lack of communication between the PCB and Mohammad Hafeez earlier in the summer didn’t help, with the allrounder retiring from Test cricket after the series against Australia and New Zealand in the UAE. Chief selector Inzamam-ul-Haq said at the time that Hafeez, had he been available, would have toured South Africa with the Test team, meaning the selectors were given precious little notice, and precious little time in which to scramble together an opening partner for Imam-ul-Haq for perhaps the hardest cricketing job in the world; opening the batting in South Africa.Masood had, more than once, spoken of his contentment at coming in one-down, batting when the openers had taken some – though not much, really – of the shine off the new ball. He was promoted to open today; Azhar Ali might have seemed the more natural candidate, averaging over 47 in that position with the vast experience he brings. Masood, though, as he has done all series, brought to the opening slot his new, sound technique, and a plan to combat the short ball that didn’t include panic. He scored 61 to add to his 44 in the first innings and 65 in Centurion, having looked by a mile Pakistan’s most consistent batsman.And yet, even this one positive Pakistan will draw from the tour can hardly be attributed to a tactical masterstroke. Masood came into the Pakistan squad off the back of several impressive scores with the A team against New Zealand and England, which would have made it difficult to ignore him while Pakistan were short of genuine contenders for the top order. But it wasn’t until Haris Sohail’s knee flared up on the morning of the first Test that Masood got his opportunity. If Masood had looked as solid at combating the short ball in the nets as he did out in the middle, you might have thought he wouldn’t need a last-minute injury to earn his place in the side.Yes, they batted well when everyone expected them to fold tamely. Yes, Shafiq looked like the gorgeous little player he blossoms into every now and again, invariably flattering to deceive but irresistible for long enough to shore up his place for another handful of games. There is a reason Pakistan have ever won only two Test matches in South Africa, and a side perfectly selected, well drilled and properly organised would have still been massive underdogs. But even allowing for all that, Pakistan have found themselves in positions of relative competitiveness in this series, particularly on the second evening in Centurion.The comical, farcical drama at the end of today’s play, with play called off in view of a full house under perfect light, may dominate much of the attention between now and when play resumes tomorrow as South Africa knock off the 41 they need to seal the series. But Pakistan, who appeared to tear up the batting order halfway through the Test as an admission of their own failure, must reflect whether it isn’t just the cricket but also the decision-making where they have come up short.

The focus, invariably, will be as much on the captains – Mithali Raj and Harmanpreet Kaur – as it will be on the youngsters and international stars

ESPNcricinfo staff11-May-2019First, the cricket
Velocity are led by Mithali Raj, arguably India’s best ever cricketer and captain of the ODI side; Supernovas are led by Harmanpreet Kaur, the most exciting batsman of her generation, Raj’s deputy in the ODI side and captain of the T20 team.These sides met here, at Jaipur’s Sawai Mansingh Stadium, two days ago. In that match, Raj’s Velocity lost pace, intent and eventually the match. But they still qualified for the final by pipping Trailblazers, whom they’d already beaten, on NRR.

Match info

Start time: 1930 IST
Venue: Sawai Mansingh Stadium, Jaipur.

What’s the feud?

The long-suspected acrimony between the two players became public during the World T20 in the West Indies in November. Raj was dropped for the semi-final, which India lost, and after the match Harmanpreet said she had wanted to retain a winning side from the previous match. Raj’s manager, however, then launched an unprecedented Twitter attack on Harmanpreet’s captaincy. She called Harmanpreet a “manipulative, lying, immature, undeserving captain” and also said the women’s team believed in “politics not sport”.What was the fallout?
The first casualty was the interim head coach Ramesh Powar – his contract expired days after that semi-final defeat and was not extended. Powar, who received the backing of Harmanpreet and her T20 deputy Smriti Mandhana, was critical of Raj in his report on India’s performance at the World T20. He said she had threatened to pull out of the tournament if not allowed to open the batting.Annesha Ghosh/ESPNcricinfoDid it end there?

There were a lot of emails sent by Raj and Harmanpreet to the Committee of Administrators, all leaked to the media. Raj said the episode had left her, “for the first time in a 20-year long career… deflated, depressed and let down. I am forced to think if my services to my country are of any value to a few people in power who are out to destroy me and break my confidence.” She did not directly blame Harmanpreet, saying “I am of the opinion that Harman and I are senior players and our issues, if any, should be sorted out by the two of us by sitting across the table.”What happened next?

Well, they sat down across the table – along with senior BCCI officials – within a week of Raj’s email. Raj is understood to have told Harmanpreet that Annisha Gupta, whose tweets had set off the storm, was not her manager. On her part, Harmanpreet told Raj that the decision to exclude her from the World T20 semis was not a personal choice but a collective call.About a month later, on the eve of the team’s tour of New Zealand, both Raj and Harmanpreet claimed to have “moved on” from the acrimony that, by Raj’s admission, did “hamper” the profile of the Indian women’s team.BCCISo that was that?
Or so we thought. Earlier this week, though, Raj told , “I do keep to myself [in the dressing room] and people can’t judge me for that right now…I believe what has happened has definitely made me more wiser to people around me in the dressing room… I wouldn’t say I felt lonely but I definitely feel that I was betrayed.”So has Raj settled in the side?
Since the start of the 2017 World Cup, Raj, now 36, has been largely inconsistent on whether she herself envisions herself playing the 2020 T20 World Cup or the 2021 ODI World Cup. While still a formidable force in the 50-over format, on the subject of whether retirement from the shortest format figures in her plans, Raj’s go-to refrain when fielding questions at press conferences of late has been, “You’ll see when that happens.”In March, WV Raman, the new coach of the women’s side, in a post-match review alongside stand-in captain Mandhana and Raj said that “we [him, Raj and Mandhana, the stand-in captain for the series against England women] had a chat about what she [Raj] is comfortable doing and what suits the side as well.”With that, a semblance of clarity around her batting slot in the middle order, and not as an opener, appeared to have been offered. That topic had become a full-blown controversy after India’s 2018 World T20 exit.Yet in that same interview, when asked whether the new team management had informed her of her role in the team, Raj’s answer was succinct: “Honestly, not yet.”Back to Jaipur
What Raman, Mandhana and the management make of the denial may not be brought up for discussion until the national camp in Bengaluru gets underway next month. For now, the focus remains on the action in Jaipur and the battle for supremacy between Raman-Harmanpreet’s Supernovas and Raj’s Velocity.Can 15-year-old uncapped Indian batsman Shafali Verma get Velocity off to a brisk start, like she did in her first game of the tournament? Or will Supernovas batsman Jemimah Rodrigues trump Shafali in the battle of the teenagers? Also, the in-form Danielle Wyatt could alone demolish the Supernovas attack, unless the Yadavs – Radha and Poonam – orchestrate yet another middle-overs choke with their spin.With less than ten months out from the T20 World Cup in Australia, uncapped Indians would do well to treat the Women’s T20 Challenge final as an audition for a likely call-up, and for internationals on the fringe, such as Veda Krishnamurthy and Sushma Verma, a chance for a recall into the national side.

While they have a number of potentially dangerous hitters, the worry is Afghanistan won’t consistently put up competitive totals

Jarrod Kimber in Bristol01-Jun-2019No. 8s aren’t quite batsmen; neither are they tailenders. They fit somewhere in between, with the skills to hold a bat, but without the necessary behavioural traits that allow them to do it for hours. No. 8s generally either hit or block, they rarely run brilliantly between the wicket, they struggle with real pace and quality spin, play slog shots or get out in soft ways, and often don’t play the best shots for the situation.Afghanistan are a team of No. 8s.Since the last World Cup, Afghanistan have played 64 ODIs against teams of vastly differing skill levels. In those they have ten individual hundreds. To put that in perspective, Virat Kohli will score more hundreds by the time you finish reading this sentence. Afghanistan’s rate of hundreds is lower than every team in this World Cup, and also Zimbabwe and Ireland. Only Sri Lanka (a hundred every 6.2 matches) come anywhere close to being as poor as Afghanistan’s record.ALSO READ: Nerves getting back into the camp – WarnerAfghanistan have no players since the last World Cup averaging 40, and four over 30. One of those is Mohammad Shahzad, whose batting is built for parties, not long innings. Against Australia, he played a shot that belonged in the first over as much as an ox smoking a cigarette. He made a half-volley look like a length ball and ended up sprawled as if undone by an excellent yorker. It was an okay ball and a terrible shot.Hazratullah Zazai’s average is 20.33 in his short career so far, and his shot to Cummins the over after Shahzad’s abomination was like he’d been reading the Jos Buttler manual but with a few pages missing.At No. 3 was Rahmat Shah. You could make a solid argument that Rahmat is Afghanistan’s only real ODI-quality batsman. He averages 38.90 and has four ODI hundreds since the last World Cup; even if they don’t come quick, he can bat. He kept the batting together for the longest time before finding short cover on a drive.Hashmatullah Shahidi averages 36.50, but at the painfully slow strike rate of 66.03. He bats like a man hanging in, and eventually here he was out stumped trying to defend a ball from Adam Zampa. Which has to be close to the worst dismissal in ODI cricket. His strike rate was 52.94.In at No. 5 was Mohammad Nabi, a quality T20 hitter, but no one’s idea of an ODI five. He averages 28.80 since 2015 and hits the ball hard. He was run out when he knocked one to the left of Steven Smith and had his team-mate (and captain) Gulbadin Naib was so busy watching the fielding he didn’t respond to the call.

Considering how Sri Lanka and Pakistan batted in their opening games, Afghanistan’s was a decent effort

Naib (average 24.44), joined with the power-hitting Najibullah Zadran who has probably been their best batsman in ODIs, averaging 34.75 while striking at 95.63. But he’s someone they want to come in low and provide fireworks. When the score is 77 for 5, you have to dig in. And he did, he was two off 11 balls, before Zampa gave him two full tosses, a tossed-up half-volley and a short ball, off which Najibullah scored 20. Against Zampa he was 31 off 14, against the pacers 20 from 35. Naib got some balls away, and they made a decent partnership of 83.In the 34th over, Marcus Stoinis was bowling short balls – Australia’s bowlers delivered 18% of their deliveries like this – with mid-off and mid-on up. Naib tried to swing the short ball over midwicket and skied it and was gone. Four balls later and with Naib barely off the ground, Najibullah went for a big pull shot over midwicket and skied the ball and was caught. Stoinis had two caught behinds with Alex Carey in the outfield.It was then that Afghanistan’s literal No. 8, Rashid Khan came out to bat, and he was with Dawlat Zadran a handy player in his own right. Dawlat was out pulling a ball he was lucky to have his body nowhere near. Rashid slogged some of his own-brand sixes and Afghanistan had made 207.Considering how Sri Lanka and Pakistan batted in their opening games, it was a decent effort. It’s just that it is hard to see them doing much better than this consistently. They can all sort of hit, but almost none can really bat. They didn’t handle the new ball or the short stuff, gifted legspin wickets, had a stupid run-out, there was only one quality ODI partnership, and their highest score was 51.When asked if they had the best spinners in the pre-match conference, Naib praised his bowlers, then added, “but we should be working [on] the batting line-up”. After this match, where they lost two wickets at the top and two wickets in an over, you’d think they’d need to continue to work on it.As good as their bowling is, 250 is a minimum to give their bowlers a decent chance.Australia were uninspiring, and as Zampa said, “probably didn’t bowl as well as we could have through the middle overs”. But by changing Zampa around and keeping the ball short they kept control of the game. Instead of going for the kill, it seemed more like Australia were banking that something silly would follow. They were right.Afghanistan have a T20 batting line up with agricultural methods and short attention spans. It won’t work often, but because so many of their players are dangerous, it will be fun occasionally. But at the moment it looks like Afghanistan’s batsmen are here for a good time, not a long one.

This is the first step in getting the suspension lifted, but it’s not quite a straightforward road yet

Liam Brickhill09-Aug-2019The spat between Zimbabwe’s Sports and Recreation Commission and Zimbabwe Cricket appears to have reached a resolution. On Thursday the SRC announced that the dispute had been settled, with all parties agreeing to an “Order by Consent”, with the matter now pending before an administrative court. Zimbabwe Cricket’s directors will be reinstated once the registrar of that court issues an order to that effect, and the interim committee will be dissolved.There’s a lot of legal jargon there. What does this all actually mean?Basically, it means that the SRC blinked first.They made it known in their presentation at the ICC Board meeting in July that they felt that they had grounds to suspend the ZC board, alleging electoral irregularities in the board election, as well as various other allegations. Their suspension of the board was within their powers under the act of Parliament that created the SRC, but the ICC’s perception was that it constituted unacceptable interference in cricket affairs, violating the laws to which ICC member nations have to adhere. In the meantime, the ZC board took the matter to court, appealing against the SRC’s original suspension.Still, the SRC stood their ground for a while, but as the collateral damage started to mount, with both the men’s and women’s sides stripped of their chance to compete at the T20 World Cup Qualifiers and the threat of expulsion looming, a resolution to the conflict became the only option.Sports Minister Kirsty Coventry engineered a series of meetings between the ZC board and the SRC last week. A settlement was found, and the court order – once it is issued – will make that settlement official.So will Zimbabwe’s suspension be lifted?This is certainly the first step in getting the suspension lifted, but it’s not quite as simple as that. The ICC issued a directive last month that the board be “unconditionally” reinstated as a prerequisite for the situation in Zimbabwe to be discussed at the next ICC board meeting in October. But while the SRC’s latest statement essentially brought the dispute to an end, it was somewhat light on detail. Will the board be reinstated in its entirety? What was agreed at the meetings between ZC and the SRC? These details could well be important when the ICC meet and discuss Zimbabwe’s suspension. The move does at least seem to suggest that the threat of Zimbabwe’s expulsion from the ICC and total loss of membership rights appears to be receding now. But their suspension may still stand until October.So will Zimbabwe now play in the T20 World Cup Qualifiers?Unfortunately not. The ICC has already announced their replacements – Namibia and Nigeria – as well as the fixture list for the women’s qualifier at the end of the month. So, unless the ICC backtrack and reverse their decision to replace the Zimbabwean teams, which is highly unlikely, the reinstatement of the board has come too late.Where does this leave Zimbabwe’s cricketers?For the moment, they’re still in the wilderness, but their future is a little less uncertain than it was at the start of the week. ZC still want to send a team to the tri-series in Bangladesh, and if the suspension is lifted after the October meeting, ICC funding will return and salaries can be paid.

Seven selection questions India will have to work through ahead of next year’s T20 World Cup

Dustin Silgardo01-Aug-2019ESPNcricinfo LtdWill Shikhar Dhawan keep his place in the XI?
There isn’t anything terribly wrong with Dhawan’s recent T20 record – he was the fourth-highest run-scorer in IPL 2019 – but India have a surfeit of top-three options. Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma are almost certain to maintain their spots until the World Cup, and it might be quite hard to keep out KL Rahul with his recent record – top three on the list of IPL run-getters for two straight seasons plus a 40-plus average for India. You could try to fit all four into the XI, but that would mean either Kohli or Rahul having to bat out of position, at No. 4. If anyone has to make way, it might have to be Dhawan.ESPNcricinfo LtdWhere will Kohli bat?
Kohli has batted at No. 4 six times since the beginning of 2018 and has averaged less than 30 in that position, with no fifties. His strike rate at that position is just over 115. The question with Kohli at No. 4 is how India might use him if the top three builds a strong base. Will they promote Hardik Pandya or Rishabh Pant for an explosive finish, pushing Kohli even further down, or send in Kohli anyway? Kohli’s preference would be No. 3, or even as opener as he has batted in the IPL, but India have to figure out the rest of their XI before deciding his position.Who will the wicketkeeper be?
When life on earth ends, and the sun implodes, one question might still echo around the empty universe: “Will Dhoni play?” He hasn’t retired after the World Cup, and has gone to the Kashmir valley instead. And even as Pant prepares to take the gloves for the whole of the West Indies tour, there’s no clarity on Dhoni’s status in the Indian team. If he doesn’t return, Pant, who will most likely be part of the team as a batsman anyway, will probably get an extended run as keeper. Also in the wings are Ishan Kishan, who kept during the white-ball leg of India A’s tour of the West Indies, and Sanju Samson. KL Rahul could also be an option in T20Is. Chief selector MSK Prasad has pretty much ruled out another chance for Dinesh Karthik, saying the selectors are looking for younger options.BCCIThe middle order…
That’s right, again. This time, though, things are more complicated than simply finding a No. 4. If India do play Dhawan, Rohit, Rahul and Kohli as the top four, then they need to find just one more player to join Pant and Hardik in their top seven. Of course, that player could well be Dhoni. Assuming they need to find at least one more middle-order player, the three most likely options as of now are: Shreyas Iyer – back in the India squad after having impressed in the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy, IPL and for India A against West Indies A, Manish Pandey – back after finding form at the back-end of the IPL and hitting a century for India A, and Shubman Gill – three fifties and a ton for India A in his last six List A innings. Of course, there could always be someone new knocking on the doors with a strong domestic season and IPL.Getty ImagesWho will the second allrounder be?
If Dhawan sits out to allow Kohli to bat in the top three, India will have two middle-order slots to fill. It’s likely the second will be filled by a batting allrounder, to give them a sixth bowling option. At the moment, it looks like a straight shootout between Vijay Shankar and Krunal Pandya. Although Vijay didn’t have a great World Cup with the bat, he is likely to get more opportunities, and Krunal is in the squad for the T20Is against West Indies. Krunal’s IPL record is outstanding – of all the Indian allrounders to have played the tournament, he has the best average differential (batting average minus bowling average): -1.99, even better than Hardik’s -2.39. He has scored his runs at a 140-plus strike rate and gone at just over seven an over with the ball. He seems to be the frontrunner for the spot at the moment.ESPNcricinfo LtdWill India stick with the two wristspinners?
Twelve months ago, Kuldeep Yadav and Yuzvendra Chahal were being talked about as the keys to India’s success in the shorter formats. This year, however, has been tough for the pair. They were both expensive in the IPL and, after looking to have bounced back during the World Cup, they were derailed by an England onslaught. Towards the end of the tournament, only one of them could fit into the team, with Ravindra Jadeja replacing the other. Now, both have been rested for the T20Is against West Indies, with India looking at other options. Kuldeep and Chahal are likely to get more chances, but for the moment, Jadeja looks like a certainty in the T20 side, especially after his performance for India in the World Cup semi-final, with Washington Sundar the other frontline spin option. Also lurking is the young legspinner Rahul Chahar, who has earned a call-up to the 15-member T20I squad in the West Indies after impressing in the IPL and India A tours.AFPThe split-captaincy question
With Rohit’s superior captaincy record in the IPL and discussions over Kohli’s workload management, there is a case for splitting the captaincy, and giving the T20I reins to Rohit. Rohit is already the limited-overs vice-captain and has previously led India in Kohli’s absence. A strong working relationship between them could be critical to India getting their plans right in Australia next year.

How right-arm quicks have made life hell for left-hand batsmen in the last five years

Sidharth Monga11-Sep-2019It took the umpires to move Ishant Sharma away from the angle.Just imagine the cost of bowling around the wicket to left-hand batsmen in Southampton last year. This was a pitch beginning to take appreciable turn from the rough. India had an injured spinner in R Ashwin. They were going to bat last. They had nine right-hand batsmen, the ones under real threat from spin because turn was available from only that rough outside the right-hand batsmen’s off stump. For left-hand batsmen, the rough fell safely outside the leg stump.Not only were England’s seven left-hand batsmen immune to that rough, India’s quicks kept going around the wicket to bowl to them, thus creating more and more rough for Moeen Ali to consign India’s right-hand batsmen to doom. The rough was so dramatic that Ashwin even tried bowling over the wicket to aim at the areas outside the leg stump of the left-hand batsmen.And yet, and yet… it took the umpires to warn Ishant for running on to the danger area to stop him from landing in that rough and making it worse for his own batsmen. What is the pay-off of this angle for right-arm quicks that India were willing to pay such a heavy price for it? Well, big enough, it turns out, to have, over the last five years, in partnership with offspin bowling, neutralised the statistical advantage that left-hand batsmen have enjoyed in Test cricket.ESPNcricinfo LtdIt was an advantage that has become even more significant this century. Mid-2001 is also around the time when ESPNcricinfo began to maintain its ball-by-ball data, which just happens to be a convenient starting point for this comparison. From 2001, till the end of 2014, left-hand batsmen averaged 38.72 in Test cricket, a good six runs per dismissal better than right-hand batsmen. That’s a higher advantage than the historical four per dismissal. Since the start of 2015, though, they average 30.5, one run per dismissal fewer than what right-hand batsmen have managed.One of the factors, of course, is offspin bowling, against which left-hand batsmen average 26.83 since 2015 as against 34.41 before that. While spin bowling is enjoying a general renaissance with the change in the nature of pitches in Asia, the angle has played its part here too. In 14 years before the start of 2015, offspinners bowled two in three balls to left-hand batsmen around the wicket; since then they have bowled nine in ten from that angle.ESPNcricinfo LtdThe shift for fast bowlers has been even bigger, especially given they have a much bigger incentive to bowl over the wicket than offspinners do. Offspinners basically take the lbw out of the equation when they go over the wicket because they only take the ball away: it has to pitch outside leg if it is hitting the stumps, and it has to be missing off if it pitches within. Quick bowlers, though, can swing or seam the ball back in, which becomes more dangerous when it happens against that angle going away. That’s why in the past, you would see them use the new swinging ball from over the wicket, and then change the angle once it had stopped moving.From bowling 18.68% of their deliveries to left-hand batsmen from around the wicket from 2001 to 2014, fast bowlers have bowled 40.3% from around the wicket since. The number went as high as 49% in 2018, the year in which the umpires had to practically drag Ishant away.What they are trying to do is obvious: cut the room, bring the stumps into play, and get some movement away against the angle in. Nor is it new: the king of this angle, Glenn McGrath, bowled 23.8% of deliveries to left-hand batsmen from around the wicket. Andrew Flintoff operated at 35.98%. The average cost per wicket, though, was better for both of them from over the wicket.The England coach for a major portion of Flintoff’s career, Duncan Fletcher, is known to have encouraged India’s fast bowlers to use that angle too. In Fletcher’s last Test series as India coach, India’s fast bowlers bowled 21.82% of their deliveries to left-hand batsmen from around the wicket, Australia bowled just six deliveries from that angle.ESPNcricinfo LtdWhile South Africa might have had brief success with the ploy in 2012 before ditching it, West Indies and England turned this into a long-term tactic in 2015. When England toured the West Indies, their left-hand batsmen faced more than half their deliveries from around the wicket. Stuart Broad, James Anderson and Ben Stokes then repeated the dose to Australia in the Ashes, going around the wicket 41.68% of the time and drawing a superior average of 20.7 as against 53.45 from the more conventional angle.This was not just a fad waiting to be discovered. It required a certain skill to go with it: apart from the accuracy, most important was the ability to move the ball away from left-hand batsmen. Broad and Stokes do it naturally; Anderson primarily bowled outswing (to the right-hander) but mastered inswing as his career progressed.Elsewhere, Ishant loved the angle. By 2016, with coach Anil Kumble doubling up as the bowling coach, India’s quicks were leading the revolution, bowling 66.84% of their deliveries to left-hand batsmen from around the wicket. There must have been some conviction behind it: they persisted with it despite an average of 37.69 only to reap rewards on overseas tours with averages of 17.38, 22.16 and 18.42 in 2017, 2018 and 2019. India have historically been tortured by left-hand batsmen, but with the natural swing of Ishant and Jasprit Bumrah, the necessary adjustments made by Mohammed Shami, and Ashwin’s offspin added to the mix, this team has become a nightmare for them.