Take 'Em On

The way to counter the Australians' short-pitched stuffin one-day cricket is obvious. You need to take it on. The best man to lead theIndians in this quest is the great man himself, Sachin Tendulkar.

But the little genius seems to have gone into his shelllately. He seems to have shelved his plans on hooking. He is not backing himselfenough. He just needs to be far more aggressive and pick up his shot-makingability. It could be he is not watching the ball closely. Generally a playerknows what he needs to do and Tendulkar understands what the answer to thepresent poser from the Australians is.

Australia's game plan in the first finals whicheveryone has been talking about was pretty simple. They wanted to bowlaggressively and a lot of short-pitched deliveries at the Indians. They werealso helped by the fact that the MCG pitch was a little two-paced. The odd balltook off a little bit more and so it was difficult to play cross-bat shots.That's the impression I carried talking to the players.

The Australian method was to bowl a lot shorter and make the ball come up waisthigh, in the chest region. They also bowled a lot straighter. On occasions, theyused the set play -- the third man comes in, a man goes deep for the hook. Theymade those little, subtle changes in the field. It's a captain's call. Everyoneknows what the next delivery is, all the fielders and bowlers, except for thebatsman that is. The Australians have generally bowled lot aggressively in thelast two games against India.

It paid happy dividends. The top guns of Indian battingcouldn't come up with an answer. Indian captain Saurav Ganguly in particular hasbeen targeted with the short-stuff. He doesn't look to pull or hook andgenerally essays cross-batted shots. He tried to counter-attack in Melbourne butdidn't look comfortable doing it.

The Australians have worked hard at their game plan andthe return of Brett Lee has just been the kind of news they wanted before thesummer ended. Lee has bowled with good pace and aggression in the last two gamesand generally when he is in good form, it tends to lift the rest of the attack.

If it was Lee in bowling, Adam Gilchrist representsAustralia's aggression in batting. 'Gilly' has a certain role within the team.He's been very, very aggressive in the first 15 overs. If he gets through thatperiod, he calms down and generally looks to pile on a big score. With the fieldrestrictions in the first 15 overs, he generally likes to play really hard.

Ricky Ponting too got his bearing after not looking in particularly hot form inthe last few games.

Australia is a team which tends to lift itself aroundimportant games. This has been pretty noticeable in recent years. They made theIndian batsmen cop a battering in Perth. Both Lee and Jason Gillespie got them alittle out of sorts. And then their batting continues to shine.

Still the Indians should find Sydney to their liking.It should restore some of their confidence. They have played very well here andthis is a kind of wicket which suits their style of game. They looked good inboth the games they played at the SCG -- the final Test and then the one-dayerwhich was only won by Lee's heroics with the bat. They should have theconfidence of the conditions.

I wouldn't think the season is over. They just need toget themselves sorted out tomorrow. They need the big guns like Virender Sehwagand Tendulkar to give them some sort of start. They need to be positive, righttill the last man. Now that the tail has started to perform, they needn't fearany sudden batting collapses as well.

Their bowling has generally stood up to the task. Itwill be interesting to see what answer the Indians would have to Australia'sstrategy to test them with short deliveries on Sunday.

PTI