South Africa v India tests - Jan 2018

[andy]

All 3 dismissals there were poor from Indian batting point of view...excellent pressure from SA quicks, but they all gave their wickets away there....

[meninblue]

Wonder if Steyn played in era of uncovered wickets. How much havoc he would have created.

Bowling average of 12 not 22

He's by far the best fast bowler I have ever seen and does it in all conditions

One of the best ever

He bowled superb even when he toured India on life less decks. The best pace bowler i have seen tour India.

Career strike rate of 41 is mind boggling

90 wickets at 22 in Asia is even more mind blowing

I'm just thankful the one team he has struggled against is England, we haven't suffered like other teams

90 wickets at 22 in Asia

[andy]

could be another 4 day test match on the cards

[meninblue]

All 3 dismissals there were poor from Indian batting point of view...excellent pressure from SA quicks, but they all gave their wickets away there....

Vijay flirted..pathetic short given that first time he is batting in this series. Unsettled openers should show patience here against the bowlers which can move atleast.

Shikhar, as pathetic shot selection as Vijay's. Played it as if we were 50/0.

Cheeku was the proper dismissal. Anyone would have flirted with such a beautiful delivery.

Well done to Saffers. They had Zimbos struggling in last test even without Steyn. Carrying the bowling form this series as well.

[andy]

Kohli could have avoided that delivery, yes was a good delivery, but was always going to carry away from the batsman, no need to play it.....lots of work for India to do...i wonder if they will rue not having Rahanein the side....yes not in great form, but his record away from home is excellent!

[meninblue]

Kohli could have avoided that delivery, yes was a good delivery, but was always going to carry away from the batsman, no need to play it.....lots of work for India to do...i wonder if they will rue not having Rahanein the side....yes not in great form, but his record away from home is excellent!

Things don't change overnight. This was anticipated, it's not like it is a shocker. We were 28/6 versus Lankans last month when we batted first in pace friendly conditions. having watched highlights of morning, i think if we had batted first today, then we would have been in similar situation again.

I expect better batting as the series progresses and once our boys get more net practice on the wickets as well as more used to the different conditions that such tours provide. First innings of series, no way, more so after opting out of Warmup.

Personally to me as far as batting is concerned it's depending on how many Chet and Virat score.

Ajinkya has been flopping for Mumbai as well in Ranji. But even he will get a chance given how they are performing with bat. So we will probably get to see if he was a better option than Rohit (in form batsman).

[Arthur Crabtree]

No Test in Durban. That's the one that usually helps Asian teams more.

Always going to be tough in Cape Town.

Still, India only in the same situation that SA were earlier. Maybe India's longer batting line up can recover better than SA. Going to be hard to bat last though.

[meninblue]

No Test in Durban. That's the one that usually helps Asian teams more.

Always going to be tough in Cape Town.

Still, India only in the same situation that SA were earlier. Maybe India's longer batting line up can recover better than SA. Going to be hard to bat last though.

I enjoyed the Johannesburg test. That awesome partnership of Sachin and Azhar. Glorious strokes by both. The best i have seen in SA.

In NZ, the best i saw was Gauti, batting for almost one and a half day. I think that innings helped us draw

[Dr Cricket]

thought India was good in the field and the aggression they showed was good, but boy the aggression with the bat wasn't needed.
india are just about in the game because of the good bowling performance but they will need a century from one of Pujara, Rohit sharma or even Saha/Pandya if they are going to get back into this game.
very disappointed with the way india batted in the short session with the bat.
not really sure why they wanted to dominate the bowlers.

India will need the long batting line up to score runs to make up for the 3 early wickets today.

Anyway tomorrow is a new day and maybe Rohit, Pujara, Saha, pandya etc will make a name of them selves tomorrow.

Kohli and Shastri probably need to be smart with their aggression especially in the batting, if they bat in that aggressive manner in the next 12 test they will lose far more games than they win.
they need to be smart and play what the conditions/situation requires.
for all the talk through the past few days at the moment Kohli and the team didn't back it up with the bat, they did back it up with the ball.

india still got a chance here but they will need at least an hundred run partnership from Rohit and Pujara and then if the likes of Saha, Ashwin, pandya, Bhuvi and Shami get scores then india still got a chance of get close to SA or getting a small lead.
they probably missed a good opportunity to get a good amount of lead to compensate of batting last.

[Dr Cricket]

pressure will be on pandya with the bat as well as well as rohit sharma.
Rohit will need a score to justify getting picked ahead of Rahane.
likewise Pandya will need to score runs to justify going with 5 bowlers and dropping Rahane.
Although I think pandya justified his spot with the ball, he did far better with the ball than I expected from him now he need to do it with the bat.

[Dr Cricket]

another point think india picking Dhawan might have cost them this test match, it is insane to drop your best opener to play Dhawan, if they really wanted Dhawan in the team they could have dropped vijay, although the best option was to not pick Dhawan at all for the team.
Ridiculous to pick dhawan because he scores quickly, they clearly don't know about rahul considering he can score quickly and got way more shots and ability, but crucially enough he got the technique and temperament to score runs and know when to give the bowlers some respect.
Sadly it seems his habit of becoming a root cost him his spot, he really needed to convert a lot of his 50s to hundreds.

Wonder if india had Rahul opening maybe india wouldn't have paniced and had a franatic end to the day today.
Shocking stuff considering few days ago an article on cricinfo said Virat kohli needed the openers and Number 3 to see off the new ball considering both kohli and Rahane struggle with the new ball and when Kohli faces with the old ball he can score big runs and make hey.
so you would think with that they would try and pick the two best openers and not allow the number 4 and number 5 to face the new ball.

[andy]

You need two settled openers, merry go round does no one any favours....Rahul and Vijay are the two best openers, therefore they should be playing reguarly..

[Dr Cricket]

You need two settled openers, merry go round does no one any favours....Rahul and Vijay are the two best openers, therefore they should be playing reguarly..

Injuries muck them up too much gave Dhawan a shot at the team again and he takes it by scoring hundreds for fun.
the annoying part is all 3 were in good form so Kohli/Shastri just picked they fav and who was in form last.

ironic part was that in the first sri lanka test the openers were going to be Kl Rahul and Dhawan.

not really sure what the management see in Dhawan that they will do anything to make him play in the team.

[meninblue]

You need two settled openers, merry go round does no one any favours....Rahul and Vijay are the two best openers, therefore they should be playing reguarly..

All 3 openers are settled in home conditions. Just that we have moved away from comfort zone. I won't be surprised if our batting collapses yet again - more worse than this. The excuses are being made. Shastri was saying this team is up for it, Virat was saying they have nothing to prove to anyone. Warm up was cancelled. Saha is batting at 6 in first test itself. The SL T20 series was scheduled. Everything was at fault. The only preparation we had was a lovely wicket where our batters struggled to 28/6. Yet think tank was not convinced a warm-up will help to change the attitude, strategy and mindset for test series. It's just not the flop show of batters which is likely to result in a loss. There are many reasons why we have struggled as a batting unit.

[andy]

I know it says on scorecard that Saha is batting 6, but i'd be suprised if Ashwin didn't walk out at 6