It was a moral victory for the Board President’s XI as the SouthAfricans were restricted to 293/6 at stumps on the first day of theirthree day game at the Brabourne stadium on Saturday
Anand Vasu19-Feb-2000It was a moral victory for the Board President’s XI as the SouthAfricans were restricted to 293/6 at stumps on the first day of theirthree day game at the Brabourne stadium on Saturday. Having lost veryfew wickets in the first two sessions, a huge score looked likely ifthey could keep their nerve after tea. They failed to do that and thePresident’s XI bowlers capitalised, striking hard in the day’s finalsession by taking four wickets.When Hansie Cronje won the toss he immediately elected to batfirst. Having played a lot of limited overs cricket in the recentpast, the visitors were keen to get some solid match practice in thelonger form of the game.Herschelle Gibbs and Gary Kirsten began sedately enough, but DebashishMohanty seemed keen to get the South Africans off to a goodstart. Mohanty slipped the ball down the leg side to Kirsten withregularity and was worked away easily for runs. Gibbs on the otherhand got almost nothing loose and was content biding his time at thecrease. It was not until the seventh over, that Gibbs got off themark, in fine style too, as he smashed an over pitched deliveryoutside off stump past mid off. The ball raced to the fence andsignaled Gibbs’ arrival at the crease. Gibbs was truly in good nick ashe followed up his off drive with a fluent cover drive off the verynext over. Once again the ball was right there in the slot and Gibbswasted no time in smashing it away.Murali Kartik was introduced into the attack at the end of the 10thover and began well. The youngster threw the ball up, got the ball toturn away from the right hander and had Gibbs struggling in the veryfirst over. Gibbs became very circumspect after he played anextravagant shot to a ball wide of the stumps and was beaten in theflight and turn.Just two overs later there was a change in the bowling at the otherend as Kumaran was taken off the attack. Kumaran bowled a tight firstspell, conceding just ten runs off his six overs. In contrast,Mohanty’s five overs cost him 33 runs. Amit Bhandari replaced Kumaranat the Pavilion End.The fifty came up in the 15th over. There was no real urgency in thetwo batsmen and that was only to be expected.Gibbs was never comfortable against Kartik, but frustrated the bowlerlong enough to make him try something different. Kartik, tired ofbowling a full length, dropped the ball short. He was promptlydispatched to the point fence by Gibbs. Kartik was at his best when hethrew the ball up and gave it time to turn. After he bowled the ball abit flatter and was taken for a boundary, Kartik was replaced byHarbhajan Singh.As lunch approached, Amit Bhandari began to tire and bowled ratherloosely. Gibbs was well set by this time and did not mind playing wellaway from his body. He middled the ball with ease and sent the ballskidding off the turf on the off side more than once. At the other endKirsten brought up his fifty in characteristic fashion, nudging theball away for a single. Kirsten, who usually takes his time brought uphis fifty off just 64 balls.Both batsmen were particularly eager to use the sweep shot and did sowithout much risk. There were almost no instances when the ball wentoff the top edge or was mishit. The South African hundred came up inthe 29th over with Kirsten on 52 and Gibbs on 45. Gibbs was content togive Kirsten most of the strike against Kartik. This ploy worked wellfor Gibbs, but Kirsten was not as lucky. The southpaw attempted to cuta ball wide of the slip fielder. The ball from Kartik did just enoughto surprise the batsman. Kirsten was not totally in control of theshot and Azharuddin diving full length at slip snatched the ball outof the air just as it was going past him. Kirsten’s innings of 56included seven boundaries. At the fall of Kirsten’s wicket, lunch wastaken.Resuming after lunch, Kartik bowled well, his confidence up after hepicked up the wicket of Kirsten. Gibbs continued to treat Kartik withcare. He was joined at the wicket by Jacques Kallis who planted hisfoot well down the wicket and played with a straight bat. He did notlook in any trouble even when Kartik was varying his loop and bowlingwell. Kallis’ use of his feet also did its bit to tame the Indianspinners.Against the grain of play, Harbhajan Singh picked up the wicket ofGibbs who attempted to sweep the off spinner and ended up under edgingthe ball. It speared towards the ground, appeared to bounce off Gibbs’boot and ballooned up in the air presenting Kaif at short leg with aneasy catch. There was some doubt about whether the ball came off theboot or the ground and Gibbs stared down the wicket in disappointmentwhen the umpire lifted his finger and sent the opener on hisway. Gibbs had made 53.Daryll Cullinan along with Kallis changed the tempo of the game verysoon after they came together. Both batsmen were keen to dominate thebowling and played some handsome strokes. Sweeping and driving withthe spin, they took to Harbhajan Singh. Even Kartik was taken for onebig six as Kallis came down the wicket, got to the pitch of the balland lofted it effortlessly over long on for six.When Harbhajan Singh bowled the ball outside the line of the stumps,it was easy for the batsmen to pick him up and whip the ball away onthe onside for runs. With the field well spread out, there wasn’t muchdanger in lofting the ball if the batsmen picked the right spots.The 150 came up in the 45th over as Nayan Mongia made yet anotherGaffe and let a Harbhajan quicker delivery fly away to the boundaryfor four byes. After MSK Prasad and Sameer Dighe displayed less thanimpressive ability behind the stumps in the recent past, this matchwas the ideal opportunity for Mongia to win his place back. However,Mongia did not look himself through the course of the first twosessions.Kumaran got the ball to move well off the wicket and had Cullinan in abit of strife. Cullinan attempted big strokes to the medium pacer. Thefact that Cullinan had a high back lift and an expansive followthrough made him a shade late on the ball and the slightest bit oflateral movement made it difficult for him to adjust his stroke. Hewas lucky to survive a confident shout for LBW, but lived on tostruggle further.Kallis had a big let off when he was on 34 as Nayan Mongia grassed aninside edge off the bowling of Kartik. Beaten in the flight, Kallis’full blooded drive missed the mark as his foot was not to the pitch ofthe ball.Amit Bhandari came back into the attack after Kumaran finished a tidyspell of four overs for just three runs. The flow of runs was stemmedafter and Bhandari continued to test the batsmen. Confident to theextent of testing Kallis with a bouncer, Bhandari started his newspell with a maiden over.Kartik’s run of bad luck continued as Cullinan chopped a ball straightthrough Azhar at slip. Azhar was late on the ball and it flew awaypast him to the vacant third man region for four. Cullinan wasstumbling along on 17 at this point. Just when it looked like Azharcould do no worse he dropped a sharp chance, this time of Kallis. TheMumbai crowd began its slow hand clapping and booed the former Indiancaptain outright.Just before tea, Cullinan finally got bat on a short wide all fromMohanty and smacked it away for four square of the wicket. The periodbetween lunch and tea was one of mixed success for the Indians. Thoughthey stemmed the flow of runs, which threatened to get out of handinitially, the Indians could not pick up any wickets. The SouthAfricans got away with some less than determined batting thanks mainlyto sloppy Indian fielding. Neither batsman looked comfortable againstKartik, who had toiled manfully in his spell of 21-0-69-1. At tea,South Africa were 192/2 with Kallis and Cullinan on 42 and 31respectively.After tea, things began to happen. The first to go was Daryl Cullinanas he tried to sneak in a quick single off the bowling of DebashishMohanty. Unfortunately for him, he picked out the sprightliest fielderof the President’s XI Mohamed Kaif who threw the stumps down and hadCullinan struggling to make his ground. Cullinan made 43.South African captain Hansie Cronje came to the wicket at the fall ofCullinan’s wicket. He and Kallis then pushed the scoring on for awhile. Soon after Kallis reached his half century, he played a lazyshot to a ball from Mohanty that jumped off the wicket. With the ballhanging in the air outside the off stump, Kallis nicked the ballthrough to Mongia who pouched the catch easily.Pieter Strydom showed a lot of initiative while he was at the crease,attempting to dominate the spinners. He played a couple of good shots,but he too did not last long. In attempting to work Harbhajan Singhaway, Strydom presented him with the simplest of catches. Harbhajan isan excellent fielder off his own bowling and made no mistake with thecatch.Amidst crowd chants of “Zulu! Zulu!” Lance Klusener walked out to themiddle. He began sedately, giving the crowd little to cheerabout. Soon he got in to the act and clouted the ball off the backfoot. The two times he did that, he found the fielder and did not getoff the mark. Out of frustration, he tried to cut a very straight ballfrom Murali Kartik and was bowled. Kartik was easily the pick of thebowlers and with some luck could have had at least three more wicketsto his credit.While wickets were falling at one end, Cronje was batting sensibly atthe other end, attempting nothing fancy. He was joined by stumper MarkBoucher who also played in the same vein. After Cronje got his eye in,he used his feet well, coming down the wicket and tonking the ballover midwicket for a one bounce boundary.Consecutive boundaries for Boucher off the 88th over of the day gaveeveryone a clear idea of how flat the wicket was. Cronje showed thathe wasn’t very far behind in the very next over and did his bit tosully Murali Kartik’s figures. The last few overs before close werenot good for the Board President’s XI. Shoulders drooped in the fieldand they were clearly playing for close. The South Africans had nosuch thoughts and were playing as positively as ever.Kartik in particular was impressive as he stuck to his task all daylong. At the end of the day, both sides will return to the pavilionwithout too much to worry about. South Africa had a good knock out inthe middle and the President’s XI put up a good enough display in thefield.