India's England tour: 66 days of hell

I’m thinking really hard, and I cannot recall such an unexpected outcome as we’ve just seen after India’s visit to England. We knew that India had been ranked No 1 in the world for some time, and that status seemed fully justified, both in the ODI format and Test matches. We knew also that England were strong again, having demolished Australia. But what if Australia had simply become so soft that most countries could flatten them now?

Weren’t India still boasting a collosal batting line-up? Weren’t Tendulkar, Dravid, VVS, Gambhir and Sehwag still at their mighty best? Wouldn’t England have their work cut out against Zaheer Khan, Harbhajan Singh and the rest? Wasn’t MS Dhoni one of the most dynamic and imaginative of leaders?

There were people willing to predict that England would win not only the Test series but the 50-over and Twenty20 contests as well. But I know of nobody — probably there simply wasn’t anybody — who was prepared to predict that India would go home this week without a single victory against England in any of the formats. Shades of 1959, when England won all five Test matches here against DK Gaekwad’s team. There was no such thing as international limited-overs cricket then, so we’ll never know whether the 1959 Indians might have descended to even deeper depths of disappointment half-a-century ago.

Suffice to say that for all their lustrous batting line-up, and with their admirers looking nervously at the calendar, India need to find some bright new batsmen, and quickly. On the face of it, there seem to be plenty to choose from. But what enormous gaps they will be expected to fill. The statistics for the glorious five mentioned in the opening paragraph are staggering. If those stars are not emulated over the next few years, India are in for a depressing time.

Nor is the bowling situation any more uplifting. Is Zaheer Khan finished? What about Harbhajan? Will Ishant Sharma be strong enough physically and mentally to lead the attack? Can Sreesanth control his emotions and come back? From the memories of this 2011 contest, when I think of Indian bowling I think of Praveen Kumar, an “old-fashioned” medium-pacer, line and length and a little bit of late curve. Throughout this series, he seemed the only Indian bowler likely to take wickets. That is a remarkable and alarming comment to have to make.

By contrast, England are so very well organised now, and must be the envy of the world. They have three competent and well-respected captains for the varying formats; they have a chief coach, Andy Flower, who is extremely sensible; and further back-up comes from the likes of the great Graham Gooch. If you have talent, it must be an absolute delight to be part of England’s current team. The spirit is high, there is harmony, there is discipline and there is fun and pleasure in doing what they are so skillfully doing. It’s been a long wait. And now the team and the overall set-up are the envy of the world.

English cricket is money-laden: of that there can be no question. But it is not money-driven before all else. It is supposed here in England that India’s cricket is money-orientated to the exclusion of all other considerations, with the IPL structure blinding people who should know better. The IPL is luring top cricketers away from Test cricket, either in total or at times when preparation for a Test series should be the priority. Test cricket today is a precisely planned operation.  You can’t just drop in the night before the first Test and pick up the threads, still counting your dollars from your “affair” with the IPL. This rogue distraction, lucrative though it is, needs to be rationalised.

Many colourful memories attach to the recent England-India encounters. Alastair Cook came so close to scoring a triple-century; Kevin Pietersen and Ian Bell both registered double-centuries; Matt Prior made a muscular ton and Eoin Morgan made another with his magical, mystical range of strokes. Jimmy Anderson swung the ball like a toy; Stuart Broad came back from the shadows and topped the Test series averages with 25 wickets at 13.84 simply by reverting to a fuller length and using his God-given talents to the full once more.

By contrast, only Rahul Dravid reached three figures for India in the four Tests, all of which were lost. And he did it in three of them. It was rather like the West Indies champion of pre-1939, George Headley, who usually made a hundred as his team usually lost.

Dravid was already a greatly respected cricketer in England, as well as around the world. I’d go as far as to say now that he is revered. No more one-day cricket for him now; but India will be praying that he goes on batting successfully in Tests until he emulates Jack Hobbs, who batted on for England until 1930, when he was 47 years old — though this would seem too far-fetched a hope.