Bhogle's round-up of events.

[gator]

There is a feeling when you are playing what are essentially warm-up games that you don’t really need to win; that if your batsmen have had a decent amount of time in the middle, if your bowlers have bowled a reasonably lengthy spell without bowling to first slip or on their own toes, then it is mission accomplished. Looked at from that limited perspective, India had a good game against Sussex. Most of the top order produced runs at some stage and the bowlers got two opportunities to acclimatise. I suspect though that India missed the opportunity of making a statement. Had India beaten Sussex with a bit of fuel left in the tank, it would have told the opposition, currently in strife over their one-day form, of their intent. This was at best a decent Sussex side; not a single player there was likely to play a higher form of cricket in the immediate future and by beating them handsomely, India would have discovered a thing or two about themselves. As it turned out, the game got a bit close and India’s bowlers were stretched a bit. The opportunity to win was there but India couldn’t put their foot down. Sometimes you have to display intent as you have to display form. Australia do that all the time, England did that against the Aussies very early on in the 2005 series and the world champions saw a bit of that on the 1998 tour of India when they played Mumbai.

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• Murali 15 off record • Dravid rested, Tendulkar to lead• Middlesex lose despitertik’s five-for • Trophy won in Belfast yet to be traced Having said that, India have two key areas to look at during the game at Chelmsford. Wasim Jaffer needs runs behind him because a good start is going to be the key to India’s batting success in England. You get the feeling with Jaffer that he is a touch lethargic and so is a slow starter. Players like him benefit the most from having two matches before the first Test. I fear he also needs to be on his toes a bit more in the field. This is a slow moving side and Jaffer adds to the slowness. And Mahendra Singh Dhoni needs more time behind the stumps. This was one of his poorer displays because he discovered, as others have before him, that a cricket ball can suddenly possess a mind of its own after having passed the stumps. As the ball swerved and swung, poor Dhoni was reduced to flapping at it at times and once finished his take only to find the ball was about four inches away and thence, on its way to the boundary. India need him in form because on good batting surfaces they don’t have the firepower to knock the opposition out and need to hold on to every opportunity that comes their way. His colleague, Dinesh Kaarthick, had a better match and, at the risk of talking him up too much, looks increasingly like a proper opening batsman. For someone who started off as a dasher, and who is still so young, he seems to have adapted quite admirably. He seems organised and patient, qualities his colleagues wouldn’t attribute to him at other times. Behind the stumps though, he seems to wield a megaphone. You increasingly get the feeling that the keeper’s job is as much to collect cleanly and effect a stumping as it is to be a cheerleader. I wonder if batsmen would be entitled to complain about noise pollution one day; certainly in the commentary box, we turn the volume in our ear down from time to time. And I am quite happy to miss anything that Sreesanth has to say which, actually, would be missing a great deal since he talks as much as a guest speaker would at a conference. Sreesanth’s great gift is his outswinger and his enthusiasm and those two will make him a match-winning bowler. Indeed, I would go so far as to say that he could be India’s key bowler in the Tests. But his chatter after every ball is neither humorous nor menacing and grows increasingly irritating. He could well argue that it charges him up but one day he will realize that the ball he bowls is more important than his reaction to it. He is a character and you could argue that the game needs characters but hopefully that will follow, in alphabetical order, after aggression and bowling, both of which he can be very good at. Four other stars have been in the limelight. Three of them pulled out of the 20-20 World Cup and as Sourav Ganguly told us on Star Cricket, Rahul Dravid asked them what was to be gained by playing there. It is a bold decision and a step forward for Indian cricket though I would be interested in asking if things would have been different if the cricket they have to play was spaced out a bit. With the mad schedule we have, this, I suspect, is one way of ensuring you get to rest a bit. And Kapil Dev’s ultimatum to the Board needs to be accepted; not as much because he is associated with the Indian Cricket League, but because marquee names will never be able to contribute to the running of an academy. I work very regularly with Sunil Gavaskar and I can see how busy he is, and have no doubt that with his business interests Kapil is just as busy. Neither should ever be head of the academy. You could use them in smaller, more strategic roles, but the director of the academy has to have the time and should feel honoured at having the job. You need someone with fewer balls to juggle. http://cricket.expressindia.com/fulliestory.php?content_id=204706

[Chandan]

But his chatter after every ball is neither humorous nor menacing and grows increasingly irritating.

To whom? If batsmen get irritated, then thats what the bowler wants. If Harsha gets irritated, then Sreeshant wouldn't care less!

[Ram]

To whom? If batsmen get irritated, then thats what the bowler wants. If Harsha gets irritated, then Sreeshant wouldn't care less!

hahaha ! Now that comment is the perfect example of the phrase " Tongue in cheek". Well said !

[zubinpepsi]

To whom? If batsmen get irritated, then thats what the bowler wants. If Harsha gets irritated, then Sreeshant wouldn't care less!

I think Harsha has a point there.. If u dont back itup with ur performance then those lil chatters will be a perfect example of empty vessels make the most noise.. and i like sree's attitude (unusual for an indian player) but sometimes it seems too much and he looks like a clown.. lets see how he performs in england.. everything will b good if he walks the talk, otherwise he ll standout as a joker..