Tired and tested Indian pace attack

[Switchblade]

http://indianexpress.com/article/sports/cricket/tired-and-tested-indian-pace-attack/ Zaheer Khan had bowled 43 overs in New Zealand’s second innings by the close of play on Day Four. Only once in his career did he bowl more: 48 overs in St John’s against the West Indies in 2002. But that was over eight and a half sessions as the West Indies batted almost three days. He was 23 years old then. The body could take a lot more workload. Let’s analyse what kind of a workload we are talking about here. He takes 15 strides in his run up. He doesn’t run in full tilt, therefore, the average stride length, by a conservative estimate, is roughly 1.5 metres. Add another four steps of follow-through. Which means, in an over, he runs about 170 metres. In the second innings, therefore, his 35-year-old body was made to run about approximately 7.3 kilometres just to bowl. No wonder then that towards the end, it looked like he was almost dragging himself around in the field. Were India a bowler short? Could a fast bowler here have shared the workload that Zaheer, Ishant Sharma and Mohammed Shami carried? The answer is subjective, and can be argued endlessly. Another fast bowler in place of the lone spinner doesn’t really lighten the existing burden. Ravindra Jadeja, for example, bowled 49 overs. Had there been an extra fast bowler in his place, all those overs would still have to be bowled. Playing five bowlers (four seamers plus one spinner), meanwhile, is not an option. “The kind of combination we have at the moment, you can’t have four seamers and a spinner. Your batting line-up becomes weak,†says Cheteshwar Pujara. However, a fourth fast bowler — an Umesh Yadav — could have brought much-needed edge to the proceedings when the things were not going India’s way on Sunday and Monday. But let’s not consider what might have been and focus on what was. Ishant Sharma was one over short of his all-time mark, 40, set in Adelaide in 2008. Though he is 10 years younger than Zaheer, his stride is significantly longer which directly means more kilometres to run.

[rkt.india]

Here is again what I had posted in match thread.

shant 15, Shami, 10, Zak 9..all the three fast bowlers too enough wickets for a 2 test series, but they bowled a lot of overs, more than NZ for those wickets 100 o rmore. Once Zak got MOS against England at home in 2008 for taking 8 wickets in 2 tests, but what set us back was 4th bowler who could be helpful to break those big partnerships which left as derailed and this 4th bowler was a spinner on unresponsive pitches and bowled 89 overs too for 3 wickets in 4 innings at 85. Southee, Boult, Wagner all took 11, 11, 10 wickets respectively and bowled far less overs than our bowlers. They did not need 4th bowler to help them, but we needed, we cannot do it with 3 bowlers and 4th bowler could not do that. A 4th pacer would have taken more wickets than Jadeja, the spinner which would have helped ensuring that we bowl less number of overs and could have get them out earlier then we did. To win the test, we were asking our 3 main pacers to take 7 wickets each which is a bit too much, IMO because our 4th bowler could not take wickets at the crucial time. You rarely see 3 bowlers taking 20 wickets, 7 wickets each respectively. Even Steyn only takes 5 wickets per match and he is an ATG. they had Anderson and Neesham to share the workload of main pacers time to time without letting batsmen feel comfortable. We did not. We had Jadeja, Kohli and Rohit whom they played easily. Our bowlers had to bowl far too much without rest and when you bowl too many overs, your wicket taking ability goes down and even these pace bowlers are inconsistent. Only Shami took wickets in every innings he bowled which is important. If you depend on just 3 bowlers and one of the 2 does not take wickets in an innings, like Ishant in 2nd innings in 2nd test, Zak in first innings in 2nd test, you have nowhere to go.

[Switchblade]

Here is again what I had posted in match thread.

RKT Bhai apki knowledge itni acchi hai plz aap team k bowling coach ban jao aur kuch bowlers ko sikha do shayad team jitney lag jai

[saneindian]

How many catches did the Kiwis drop? We dropped 11 chances, thats on an average 3 chances per innings, 6 of them were dropped chances of Mccullum. Without those dropped catches Mccullum would have scored 46 and, instead he scored 224 and 302. In two innings where we did not drop a chance of him,he scored 1 and 8!! Without those dropped catches, would not have bowled more than 100 overs in any of the innings.

[GautiMaan]

We dont even have half decent part timers to share the load,before sehwag used to sneak a wicket or two,ganguly,sachin etc could be handy.

[Marut]

I think India must boldly adopt the four + one or five seamer strategy while playing outside the subcontinent. It will weaken the batting, but our batsmen won't have to make mountains of runs with the improved bowling outfit. Again going with three bowlers is a very defensive strategy that will not win you a single match. Has the extra batsman ever helped India save any match in these last three years? Dump Rohit and bring in a hot seamer - Yadav.

[Lord]

Don't think its fair to blame bowlers alone.Firstly we dropped easy and crucial catches.Even the best attacks suffer if you keep dropping those catches.We'd have bowled them out much more cheaply if the catches were held. Then our batting in 1st innings of 1st Test was poor too.conceded a 300 run lead which meant we couldn't win even though we bowled them out for 100. Not defending the bowlers,but its not the only factor imo

[Lord]

How many catches did the Kiwis drop? We dropped 11 chances, thats on an average 3 chances per innings, 6 of them were dropped chances of Mccullum. Without those dropped catches Mccullum would have scored 46 and, instead he scored 224 and 302. In two innings where we did not drop a chance of him,he scored 1 and 8!! Without those dropped catches, would not have bowled more than 100 overs in any of the innings.

exactly

[CG]

Doni wanted good ground fielding and he got them.Seniors like laxman ,dravid,Sachin,Sehwag[when fit] were good catchers,but current crop are not natural slippers except rohit may be.Also we have been rotating too much first ash win then kohl now rohit.we need to fix their positions and allow them to work on it.

[Number]

Tried and tasted => Ishant by Dhoni.

[Marut]

If we had five bowlers there was no way in the world NZ would have recovered to 680. All our bowlers were dead tired and were throwing pies as the game wore on. With five bowlers, the load would be shared, the bowlers would be fresh, and NZ would have never crossed 350.