Exchange students pass the Test

UMPIRE'S POST

Indians have learnt how to win abroad; others have learnt how to win in India.

In the first 70 years of playing Tests, India won 13 away from home. In the last eight, it has won 17. This includes matches in diverse conditions and on all kinds of pitches. That is an overseas record comparable with the best in the business.

In the best traditions of Indian cricket, this could not be an unalloyed blessing. Thus, in the period of stellar overseas performance, India's formidable record at home has begun to look less so.

The defeat to South Africa in Ahmedabad by an innings and 90 runs was India's worst in half a century. Since 2003, we have won seven Tests at home and lost five. In the eight years before 2003, we won 16 and lost only seven.

New Zealand and England used to lose regularly in India. But in the last five years, each has drawn a Test series here. Pakistan, after losing the friendship series on its home turf, squared the return series in India.

Soon after, Adam Gilchrist, captaining Australia, conquered the Final Frontier, succeeding where the all-conquering Steve Waugh had fallen in 2001. Of the three series wins for India in the last five years, two have been by the slender margin of 1-0.

The reasons for India's improved show overseas are obvious. Our fast bowlers, who always did well overseas, received enormous support from a new and improved Kumble.

Our batsmen learnt to play on the backfoot and on the rise. Sehwag and Jaffer gave good starts. We stopped losing games before they began, at the sight of green pitches and seaming or swinging conditions.

A prime example was Headingley, Leeds, on the England tour before last year's. Trailing 0-1, we chose to bat first on a sticky wicket and won a glorious victory. The win at Perth, perhaps the bounciest pitch anywhere, stands out, too.

At the same time, the batsmen of other countries have learnt to play in India and handle our spinners. Inzamam and Younis Khan, the Pakistanis, could be expected to do well in India and did. In recent times, Damien Martyn of Australia and Jacques Kallis of South Africa have done very well too.

We no longer build the dust bowls that we built in the first half of the 1990s, which made Venkatpathy Raju look lethal. The runs conceded per wicket and the number of balls bowled to take each wicket have risen for Indian spinners.

When it comes to bowling at home, our current fast bowlers do not match up to Srinath and Prasad. The new crop has not yet mastered how to bowl in India. The foreigners, as Steyn showed, have.