Gary Kirsten anxious over Indian pace attack
A coach’s biggest achievement, apart from winning series and tournaments for his team, is to develop world-class players under his aegis. A coach always strives to make a player realize his abilities and reach for the highest accolades in cricket, earning the right for the player to be called a great performer.
But recently, Indian coach http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Gary-Kirsten-c58527 has been having a tough time with the Indian fast bowlers. Kirsten has been in charge of the Indian side for almost 20 months now and India have already tried more than a dozen different seam bowlers in ODIs during this time period. Yet, not one bowler has been able to leave a mark and that has left Kirsten a tad worried.
Kirsten would have ideally liked to identify a few good bowlers with the potential of surviving on the international stage for the next few years and ensure that the side is benefitted by their presence. However, in spite of being given so many options, Kirsten was unable to spot something special in any of these bowlers.
The numbers clearly indicate that none of the bowlers would have been given a consistent run of games to prove themselves. But Kirsten argues that in today’s scenario when the game is moving ahead rapidly and when all the teams are only looking at winning more and more games, chances are bound to be minimal. It is imperative for the bowlers to be ready at all time to prove their worth. The bowlers need to anticipate if they are likely to receive a call from the BCCI based on their performances but even if they do not get the chances, should not get disappointed.
Kirsten's concerns over the Indian pace attack were amplified on the first day of the first Test match between India and http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Sri-Lanka-c758 in Galle. India managed to pick only two wickets on the first day after conceding 256 runs on a rain-curtailed day. Even earlier, in the three-day warm-up match, the Indian bowlers were put to sword by the opposition.
To carry forward the success story that India has maintained over their last 16 Test matches now, the Indian side went in with only four front line bowlers in the Test. Leading the pace attack was http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Ishant-Sharma-c64566 who has faced a rather disappointing time at the international level in the last year or so.
Partnering him was debutant Abhimanyu Mithun, who has an impressive strike-rate of picking wickets in the first-class arena. In the absence of Zaheer Khan, http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Ashish-Nehra-c46293 and to an extent, Sreesanth, the Indian pace bowling department looked non-threatening to say the least. Zaheer and Sreesanth were injured, while Nehra has decided to opt out of Test match cricket to ensure longevity of his career.
The sub-standard nature of the Indian pace bowling attack was clearly exposed on the first day by the Sri Lankan batsmen who took full advantage of a mediocre bowling attack. Ishant Sharma was expected to provide early break-through for India, but on the contrary, he ended up conceding 79 runs in 14 overs.
Mithun managed to pick up a wicket of Dilshan early in the innings but apart from that, id not look quite ready for the international stage.
The coach said that he had still not lost faith in Ishant and was willing to give the youngster more time. After he made an impactful start to his career, his performances tapered off but that could have been due to the heavy expectations from the fans and over-bowling in the IPL. Kirsten said that he believes in his abilities and does not want to judge him on the basis of his performance in just a couple of games.
Kirsten knows that Ishant has lost a lot of his confidence and is willing to support the fast bowler completely in regaining that lost confidence.
The Indian team has also been missing an all-rounder for quite some time now. When http://www.senore.com/Cricket/India-c750. Suddenly, people started idolizing him until one day he was dropped from the side due to poor performance with the ball, as he dropped on pace and lost his swing. India needs someone who can fit into the role of the fifth bowler and also bat well at the sixth or the seventh position.
Given the circumstances that the Indian pace department is at the moment, the hunt for the country’s next is on. Kirsten’s not given up hope yet, but patience will be running thin.
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