Bowlers pack a punch, finally

Where we drastically need to improve is not giving boundary opportunities and easy boundary balls in the first 10 overs when the ball is new and the batsmen can actually use your pace. That will be the key factor, how we bowl in the first 10 overs

—MS Dhoni, on the eve of India's World Cup opener against Pakistan

By restricting Pakistan to 46/1 in 10 overs at the Adelaide Oval on Sunday, India's bowlers did a commendable job. Having said that, the match was far from over. Haris Sohail was middling the ball beautifully, and even though Ahmed Shehzad made run-scoring look laborious, he was still hanging in there. But the operative part is that the three seamers employed in that period of play together conceded only five boundaries. Umesh Yadav was responsible for four of those. He was duly asked to take a break after three overs. Mohammed Shami dished out the other freebie. Mohit Sharma managed to keep a clean sheet.

If overs 1-10 was about reducing boundary balls, 10-25 was about choking them. A closer look at our bowling during that period reveals the success story behind our win. Dhoni employed as many as five bowlers during that 15-over period – Mohit, Suresh Raina, Ravichandran Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja and Yadav – thereby not allowing the batsmen to really settle down. The five gave away only 57 runs, including two maidens from Ashwin. The run rate was mounting alarmingly, and something had to give. It did in the 24th over, when Shehzad tried to break free. He cut a short and wide ball straight to point to give Yadav his first wicket. It was 102/3, and India sniffed an opening. A ball later, Sohaib Maqsood too played a poor shot as Yadav made it two out of three. Two minutes later, Jadeja sent back Umar Akmal and Pakistan were 103/5. The game was as good as over then. It was good ol' fashioned bowling: keep it simple, keep it tight, and the wickets will come. India haven't followed that in a while.

As one thing led to another, Pakistan crumbled under the weight of the 301-target. And for the first time in several weeks, the Indian bowling unit had something meaningful to smile about other than stopping Afghanistan from chasing 365 in the warm-up game.

If nothing, Dhoni deserves credit for managing India's thin bowling stocks which was under immense pressure both during the Tests against Australia and the tri-series. And going by the manner in which Glenn Maxwell swatted them in the first warm-up game, it looked like India's bowlers would have a World Cup to forget.

On Sunday, Dhoni was so proactive that it beggared belief. Often criticised for 'chasing the ball' and releasing the pressure by leaving huge gaps in the field, the skipper did not waver from his plan of attacking. And for the first time in recent memory, he resorted to conventional wisdom which tells you that picking up wickets is any day better than containing the flow of runs. A case in point: After Ashwin's first over – a maiden – Dhoni employed a slip for his second. He probably realised the offie was bowling at his artistic best, flighting the ball beautifully and asking questions. The moved worked like a dream. After five dot balls in the third over, Ashwin floated a classical off-break to left-hander Sohail from around the wicket. It drifted, pitched around middle and leg, and turned sharply. Sohail jabbed at the ball, and it went straight to Suresh Raina at first slip. It was as much Ashwin's wicket as Dhoni's.

During the post-match press conference, Dhoni observed that all teams were being forced to revisit their bowling strategies by doing away with the yorker and resorting to back-of-length deliveries.

"On wickets like these, we have seen if you have a partnership going, if you have wickets in hand, if someone starts to middle the deliveries, it becomes quite hard to contain the batsmen," he said. "Most of the teams are bowling back of a length and asking the batsmen to clear the boundaries. Irrespective of how good a batsman you are, that's one strategy that almost all the teams have deployed. It is working."

But he also added that this ploy wouldn't work all the time. "In some games we will see batsmen really middling their shots, and if it goes outside the boundary, they will have to go back to their other plan, which is bowling yorkers," he said, perhaps keeping in mind that India take on a brilliant South African side, overflowing with world-class hitters like AB de Villiers and David Miller, in Melbourne on Sunday.

Another reason why India eventually cantered to a win was because of the spinners. Ashwin, who took 1/41 from his eight overs combined well with Jadeja (10-0-56-1).

Not to forget the manner in which Dhoni employed his bowlers in short bursts. The moment Yadav conceded 23 off his first three, Dhoni gave him an hour-long break. The industrious right-armer came back to get those two wickets.

"…I gave him (Yadav) a break over there, brought in Mohit, and so far Mohit has been really consistent with his line and length, which I feel is the key for him. He has that variation of pace. He uses the bounce so well. So far he has proved himself," Dhoni said of that ploy.