Dravid urges India's elder statesmen to 'perform'

By Jon Culley at Trent Bridge
Friday, 27 July 2007

Bookmark & Share

India tends to view its cricketing heroes as men untroubled by normal human frailties and the collective failure of the national team's fabled middle order in the opening Test at Lord's is by no means regarded universally as a crisis. Yet there are commentators who have dared to think the unthinkable in the last few days, even asking in print whether the time for change is now closing in.

Between them, Rahul Dravid, Sachin Tendulkar, Sourav Ganguly and V V S Laxman mustered just 192 runs at Lord's, their embarrassment spared only by the combination of a better-than-expected bowling performance and the intervention of the weather.

It may be that their slow start will prove to be merely a reprise of what happened in 2002, the last time India toured here, when an only marginally better showing in the first Test, where the quartet contributed just 259 as Nasser Hussain's team took a 1-0 lead, preceded considerable improvement. In the next three Tests, the same four batsmen built an aggregate of 1,294 runs, including five centuries. The series finished all square.

The question, five years on, is whether the next two and a half weeks will show that age has finally taken its toll. Dravid, the captain, and Tendulkar are both 34, Ganguly 35. Laxman, the youngster of the four, is 32.

Dravid, distancing himself both from sentiment and personal interest, is not dodging the issue. Indeed, he made it plain yesterday that none of the quartet can be certain his place is safe.

"Clearly, the middle order need to improve," he said. "We did not perform in the last match and there is pressure on everyone to perform. As for the criticism, we have heard it before. When you are playing international sport you are being judged all the time. If people don't keep performing, you are going to have to hear this [criticism]. The only way to answer criticism is to perform. And if you don't perform people have to take what happens. It is part and parcel of being an international sportsman."

Yet the cracks have been showing for a while. Laxman and Ganguly have struggled increasingly to score runs in the highest company and even Tendulkar, with the biggest reputation of all, is showing signs of decline. His average for a Test career that has brought 37 centuries still stands at 55.15 but his last 10 Tests reveal less impressive numbers. Over that period his average is 39.88, but that figure is inflated by two hundreds against Bangladesh; take out those and it reduces to a much more modest 27.66.

Dravid's record stands up better to scrutiny but he insists the others have his full confidence. "There is a lot of quality there and it is just a question of showing that in the middle," he said. "We were in this situation in the last tour. If you remember, we lost at Lord's and we did not start well at Nottingham but we turned it round and went on to have a very good summer."

It will help to turn things around at Trent Bridge if his bowlers perform as they did at Lord's, where England's batsmen looked fallible against the left-arm pace bowlers, Zaheer Khan and Rudra Pratap Singh. "That is where we could take some confidence," he said. "Our bowling was pretty good right through the game except for the first hour.

"The heartening thing is we are not behind. It would have been tougher to fight back from being behind."

Dravid dismissed suggestions that the sometimes fiercely competitive nature of both sets of players had exceeded what was acceptable in the first Test. On the fourth evening, the Indian opener Dinesh Karthik had to be calmed down by Ganguly after reacting badly to comments apparently made by the England wicketkeeper Matthew Prior. But Dravid said: "A bit of that between the sides can be good for the game and I don't think at any stage it was out of bounds."

Ganguly has suffered from a sore back but Dravid, while confirming Yuvraj Singh had been included in today's XII as cover, was encouraged by his progress. "He will take part in the full practice session and we will have a clearer picture at the end of it. He is feeling a lot better than yesterday."

The Fallible Four: How a famed middle order has entered decline

Sachin Tendulkar (Age 34)

Test career:

Matches: 138

Runs: 10,975

Best: 248*

Ave: 55.15

Last 10 Tests:

Runs: 638

Best: 122*

Ave: 39.88

Rahul Dravid (Age 34)