da esoccer bet： © CricInfo Rarely has a young cricketer’s continued presence in the Indianteam attracted such heated discussion
V Ramnarayan17-Apr-2002
© CricInfoRarely has a young cricketer’s continued presence in the Indianteam attracted such heated discussion. While critics of a varietyof hues, belonging to different media, have been baying for DeepDasgupta’s blood, at least one newspaper has headlined a demandfor his exclusion. Surprisingly vehement, Ravi Shastri, normallysympathetic to youngsters, has been the most vociferous advocateof the Bengal wicket-keeper’s ouster.While Dasgupta’s wicket-keeping has been poor overall, I agreewith Sourav Ganguly’s assertion that Carl Hooper’s snick in theGuyana Test would have taken some catching. It seems unfair tojudge the young man on the basis of his first Test duck and thehalf-chance that might have stopped Hooper on his march to 233.In his short career, Dasgupta has batted with character andconsistency. The moment the selectors picked him and Ajay Ratrafor this tour, it became quite clear Dasgupta was first choicebecause he could also open the innings; further, Ratra’s keepingis as yet an unproven quantity, at least in Sunil Gavaskar’sopinion. If Ratra has to come in, then the only logical courseopen to the selectors for the next Test is to make Sanjay Bangaropen the innings – unless, of course, they decide to replace theskipper with a regular opener like Wasim Jaffer.The Dasgupta controversy has, however, served to distractattention from the listless Indian bowling performance. JavagalSrinath was the only bowler to make any impact in the match. Theold warhorse was admirably hostile on a wicket that apparentlyoffered nothing to the other Indian bowlers, prepared as he wasto bend his back. Sarandeep Singh looked the part of a friendlyneighbourhood off-spinner, and Anil Kumble was about as dangerousas Geoffrey Boycott’s grandmother’s lollipops.Ravi Shastri has openly stated his preference for a mediumpacer to replace Kumble unless the playing surfaces in the comingTests promise to aid spinners. The question is whether our spinattack without Harbhajan Singh is capable of inducing snicks andstumpings and, if so, whether we have a wicket-keeper to latch onto them. Unfortunately, the answer to both questions seems to bea sad “No.” The strengthening of the pace department with theinclusion of Ashish Nehra seems unavoidable under thecircumstances.India have generally been lucky in the wicket-keeping department,right from the time Syed Kirmani took over as number one stumper,although we have had trouble replacing Nayan Mongia, the subjectof a completely different controversy. Before Kirmani, except forfive Tests in the West Indies when P Krishnamurti donned thegloves, one of two flamboyant batsmen usually did duty behind thestumps for India.In the days before television coverage of India’s Tests, many ofus were under the impression that Farokh Engineer was a top classwicket-keeper, if you overlooked one bad day at the office whenhe let Australia off the hook at Chepauk from a precarious 24 forsix. However, according to some not-so-charitable stories, theBombay and Lancashire stumper went round to the Press Box in theevenings to nip in the bud any attempt to report chances he hadmissed! With his not-inconsiderable charm, he would proceed toconvince the reporters that those had not been chances at all, orif they had been, they were first slip’s and not his.