This tour will be a huge test for the Indian team for a variety of reasons. We all know that Australia are a tough, almost impossible team to beat (especially in Tests) and therefore this tour will be a test of resilience for the Indian players. It has been a strange year for the Indians. Right from a pathetic World Cup campaign to the victory in the Twenty20 Cup and then again a largely unsuccessful series against Australia, to the recently concluded successful series versus Pakistan. The other reason why this tour stands as a test for the Indians is because they have now a new Test captain who has shown himself to be astute and proactive although he was too defensive against Pakistan. My guess is that Kumble will be more aggressive against Australia- in fact I think he has no option but to be aggressive because the Australians will not be as generous with their wickets as Pakistanis were. India has also seen the rise of Dhoni and Yuvraj who are now demanding more respect as their performance has been exemplary of late. These players will also be tested as a lot will rest on their capable shoulders. However as with everything I think the onus will still be on the seniors (Tendulkar, Ganguly, Dravid and Laxman) to see that their team musters a respectable score, because they have tonnes of experience and it is experienced players who usually emerge victorious in tough situations.
Although experience and overall class of the Indian batsmen is to be applauded, it must also be stressed that generally pitches in Australia feature a higher bounce (compared to India) and hence batsmen have to play on the up. The first few overs of the match provide an excellent opportunity for the Aussies to exploit this weakness of the Indian batsmen. Ganguly’s weakness against the short ball is certain to be exploited. Dravid has also suffered from inconsistent form recently. His confidence has taking a beating following his exclusion from the ODI series against Pakistan. He wasn’t at his best in the Test series and his confidence will be challenged by the charged up and mentally aggressive Aussie pacers. Yuvraj and Dhoni do not have much experience playing overseas Tests and they have a point to prove, but on the other hand playing a Test match overseas against such a competent team will test their wits and it will be a new arena for them.
It is difficult to predict the exact nature of Australian pitches. Arguably Australian pitches are unique worldwide in that they offer everything in almost equal proportions to everyone- the pacers, the spinners and the batsmen. Recently pitches throughout Australia have become flattened to facilitate the batsmen. Traditionally the Sydney and Melbourne pitches have also assisted the spinners considerably. This is a positive for Indians because Kumble and Harbhajan are in good form.
For those who are unaware of the Test squad, it is: Wasim Jaffer, Virender Sehwag, Dinesh Karthik, Rahul Dravid, Sachin Tendulkar, Sourav Ganguly, VVS Laxman, Yuvraj Singh, Mahendra Singh Dhoni (wk), Anil Kumble (capt), Harbhajan Singh, Zaheer Khan, RP Singh, Irfan Pathan, Ishant Sharma, Pankaj Singh.
This appears to be a balanced Indian side as India are going with five specialist pacers. Ishant Sharma was effective in some spells against Pakistan whereas Pankaj Singh is yet to make his debut. The latter seems to have a decent reputation in the domestic circuit and the Indian selectors speak highly of him. Although it is balanced in terms of quantity, with five specialist pacers, in terms of quality this squad weighs heavily in favour of batsmen because two of the pacers have almost no international experience. This comes as no surprise because the Indian batting is always stronger than the bowling. Although the Australian pitches have something for everyone India will struggle generally to acclimatise to the conditions because in this recent series against Pakistan the pitches were completely flat.
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