By now there is more than a suspicion that India is on the downward slope after their climb to the top of Test cricket. A 4-0 shellacking by England has been followed by two one sided losses to a resurgent Australia. Most cricket teams albeit the truly great ones, are on a rollercoaster style performance graph and generally it depends on having all their players healthy and in top form. When a key player drops out through injury, it affects the delicate balance and the razor thin balance margins that are there at the top level, begin to tilt. In India’s case the problems are twofold. Their only match winning bowler, Zaheer Khan, has been injured and is working his way back to form. But even with Zaheer firing on all cylinders, it is not enough as the batsmen can play him out and score off the remaining bowlers. Fast bowlers hunt in pairs and in rare the case of one West Indian team, in fours.
Another factor that is worrying for India is the inability of their vaunted batsmen to score big hundreds. As a result, the bowlers do not have enough runs to attack with a large slip cordon and it ends being an exercise in containment. Tendulkar has been getting starts but perhaps the anxiety of getting the hundredth hundred has been holding him back although it should not be for a player of his experience. Rahul Dravid has forgotten where his off stump is and is being bowled through the gap with increasing frequency. Neither are Sehwag and Laxman setting the ground on fire. India’s charismatic skipper, Dhoni, has lost his golden touch and is struggling with a team that does not give him enough opportunity to attack. It remains to be seen how and when India can stop this fall. What they need are a couple of batsmen who can shore up the crumbling batting lineup, as well as a spinner and paceman to assist Zaheer. That is a monumental ask, considering India’s current talent pool and a group of resurgent Test teams chomping at the bit.
South Africa have rebounded from their first home Test defeat against Sri Lanka and have lost by a huge margin of 10 wickets on the fourth day of the third Test – giving the hosts their first series win since 2008. Without the extraordinary and unorthodox talents of Malinga and Muralitharan, the Sri Lankans are an ordinary bowling side. This puts increasing pressure on the bastmen to score runs. The second Test was Sri Lanka’s first Test win since Murali’s retirement and it remains to be seen whether it was a one-off, freak result. This could very well be the case because South Africa have totally outplayed them in the third Test and are winning by an innings as we got to print.
Tennis season in full swing
The tennis season is in full swing. Tournaments in Qatar, Chennai and Brisbane are building up to the Australian Open the first major event of the year. These events are known as Grand Slams although that was not always the case. The Grand Slam was originally, the act of winning all four major titles in the same calendar year. Don Budge was the first to do it, in 1938. Lew Hoad came within a couple of sets of doing it in 1956. Rod Laver did it twice, once as an amateur in 1962 and once as a pro in 1969. This unprecedented achievement has provoked his peers to call him the greatest ever men’s tennis player. The Grand Slam has not been won since then although Margaret Court (1970) and Steffi Graf (1988) among the women have done so. Graf won the golden slam, winning the Olympics gold medal as well at the Seoul Olympics.
Grand Slams were easier to accomplish in tennis’ earlier years because three of the four events were on grass courts. There was not as much depth in the draws and there were not many clay court topspin specialists. Now, each surface is different and there are players who specialize in each surface thus making them a threat in their conditions. The only player who has a chance to win the Grand Slam this year is Novak Djokovic. He has recovered from the long 2011 campaign and was playing really well at an exhibition in Abu Dhabi. Djokovic has an excellent defence and can attack with deadly precision. In order to beat him, a player has to play almost perfect attacking tennis for three hours or more. This is an enormous mountain to climb and proves too much for most opponents. This column predicts that Novak Djokovic will men’s tennis’ first Grand Slam since 1969, this year, should he stay healthy.
There is another intriguing event that is taking place in Perth Western Australia. The Hopman Cup is named after the legendary Australian coach Harry Hopman. Hopman was responsible for a veritable stable of world champions, starting from Sedgman, McGregor, Rosewall, Hoad to Cooper, Anderson, Fraser, Emerson, Laver just to name a few. Almost certainly, he was the most effective coach of all time. Hopman kept things simple. He made his players fitter than anyone else and made them do two on one drills all day. As Davis Cup captain he told his players to go for the lines. And it worked. Under Hopman Australian players won dozens of major titles as well as a whole slew of Davis Cups. Hopman then moved to the USA, some say he was a step ahead of horse racing bookies whom he owed money. Hopman was a compulsive horse racing enthusiast. At Port Washington Academy in Long Island New York, Hopman took the young John McEnroe and Vitas Gerulaitis under his wing; and the rest is history. The Hopman Cup is the only tennis team event featuring both sexes. The men and the women first play singles and then combine to play a mixed doubles match. A befitting tribute to a man who cast such a long shadow over the tennis world.
