Sourav soothes India's wounds

India 417-8 dec Worcestershire 200-6 Match drawn

India look in remarkably high spirits. They are smiling and back-slapping and high-fiving as if everything had come up roses. And not a trace of manure in sight.

It would be difficult to tell from watching them yesterday that they are 1-0 down in the Test series, having been bowled out twice on a flat pitch. Or that they have not won outside the sub-continent for 16 years, their sole overseas victory in that time coming in Sri Lanka eight years ago.

Maybe they have become inured to it all, maybe they suppose they can come back and do to England as they did in 1986, maybe they are dreaming of the county sides they may play for next summer, maybe they are thinking what the hell. Maybe, maybe not, but the mood in a squad which has had little rest for 14 months is testimony to the closeness of the unit knitted by the coach, John Wright, and the captain, Sourav Ganguly.

In India last winter, Ganguly seemed a busted flush as his country's captain. Outsmarted by his opposite number, Nasser Hussain, for much of the time, he looked and sounded detached. He certainly has his foibles but there is no doubt also that he has something, that he cares about his boys and that they appear to care about him. He considers himself a leader, so do they. He has survived this far despite dodgy batting form which had shown signs of recovery but is now appearing to regress again.

It was Sourav who engendered great glee yesterday by capturing the first Worcestershire wicket with his first ball of the match. It was an away swinger which curved like a banana and had Anurag Singh driving to second slip.

It was Sourav who later had David Pipe popping lamely to cover something of equally deceptive gentleness. How the tourists celebrated. That reduced Worcestershire to 200 for 6 before a huge black cloud left its longtime base above the Cathedral and unleashed its contents over the ground.

Thus ended a rain-sodden match which counted for little in the first place and mattered less after the first two days were washed out. What it means for the Second Test is anybody's guess. Not much would probably be a sound estimate. India will be grateful that Sachin Tendulkar scored 169 on the first day on which play was possible in this match.

There is a suspicion being voiced that the Little Master is human after all. It is all of eight innings since he last scored a Test hundred. Harsher observers now demand that he should start to win more matches for his country, something that 62 international hundreds have apparently not done enough of. It is not a case of questioning his greatness but of measuring it. But he will wish to take his form to Trent Bridge for the Test. Nine innings without a hundred is unprecedented since the start of his career.

Still, Tendulkar and all, the Indians' reputation in the middle order is greater than their current achievements. Several of them are being pursued by the counties next season for two main reasons. First, two overseas players per club are being allowed next year, secondly the Indians are available because they have no international engagements. For once. At last.

The off-spinner Harbhajan Singh has had at least three suitors, Lancashire, Leicestershire and Worcestershire, though it is likely he will go north. Ganguly may want to play again. Tendulkar, who would put bottoms on seats has yet to be approached.

The Indians may not have had enough cricket here. They declared at their overnight score of 417 for 8, made from 105 overs, and bruised the home side with some lively stuff after an opening stand of 84. Stephen Peters made 50 and Graeme Hick scored a painstaking 27, which was a blessing. Any more and it would have been necessary to muse again on what might have been.