India desperate to shed opening blues

Amongst the more stark reminders of India's fall since the heady days when the team was ranked No. 1 in Test cricket and had just won the 2011 World Cup is the decline in form and fortunes of Virender Sehwag and Gautam Gambhir, among India's most successful opening pairs ever.

They average over 50 overall as an opening pair in both Test matches and One-Day Internationals, but in the past year and a half, they average in the mid-30s. Equally tellingly, opening partnerships abroad have taken a great hit.

Their hands forced, India's selectors axed Sehwag from the squad for the first three matches against England. The rope for Gambhir can't be very long either.

Ajinkya Rahane has served apprenticeship for a long while and performed reasonably well. It is surely time to give him a proper run instead of a stop-start one, and allow him the opportunity to cement his spot. And if one had to look for more options, the week preceding England's first match against India in Rajkot on Friday (January 11) provided them.

In England's warm-up matches, the batting stars among Indians were M Vijay for India A and Shikhar Dhawan for Delhi. Vijay weathered an early morning start and hazy conditions to smash 76 off 75 balls, an innings full of expansive stroke-play in a match reduced to 39-overs a side. Dhawan went one better, with a splendid 109-ball 110 in the face of a steep chase of 294, two days later.

A feature of both men's innings was that they assessed the conditions well, giving the first half hour to the bowlers and punishing them afterwards. Dhawan's judgment of length and decisiveness of footwork stood out.

Mahendra Singh Dhoni, the Indian captain, admitted on Thursday (January 10) that India's openers hadn't been delivering along expected lines. "The stats suggest that for quite some time, we have not got off to a very good start," said Dhoni. "Yes, the openers have been scoring runs on and off, but we have not been able to get a good partnership between them. We are hoping to get good starts in this series. Jinx (Rahane) is the new opener. He has played on and off and done decently well."

Dhawan and Vijay are not the only ones with claims to the opening spot. With a middle order that reads Virat Kohli, Yuvraj Singh, Suresh Raina and Dhoni, the only available spot seems to be the opener's, at least in subcontinental conditions, and Cheteshwar Pujara is also someone who could fit the bill.

The Indian team has lacked an anchor who can control the flow of the innings in the way Rahul Dravid did so well for so many years. In Pujara, they might well have the man for the job. As his rollicking triple-century in the Ranji Trophy quarterfinal against Karnataka showed, Pujara can score quickly too. More than the rate at which he scored, Pujara showed the ability to improvise and unveiled lap shots, reverse sweeps and the works.

England's pace bowlers sprayed the ball a little in their warm-up matches, but if they get their lines right, there is no doubt they will pose the odd question or two, even if the pitches are docile. England have relied on a game-plan of early wickets to set the tone.

"Early wickets are the key," said Alastair Cook, the England captain. "The way of doing that is nailing your skills to put the batters under pressure so that they have to play big shots. That doesn't change wherever you are playing, whether you are playing in India or England. In the first two games, there was a bit of rustiness and a lack of rhythm to the bowling."

With more matches, the rustiness will certainly ebb for England, and if the rhythm returns, the opening batsmen could face testing times even on batsman-friendly pitches.