Of singles and dot balls

Editor's note: Recently, the Rediff Team helped put together several dossiers, on select topics, regarding India's performance in one-day internationals.

These dossiers were intended to help underline key points for the benefit of the team's think tank, with a view to fine-tuning performances as the side builds up to the 2003 World Cup.

Here, we reproduce one such -- relating to the most important, and easily the most neglected, aspect, of the way we play the one day game.

Singles

The single most important reason, pun intended, for India’s consistent lack of results is the single. Improve this, and the team’s performance -- whether setting a target or chasing -- immediately improves by a good 25 per cent.

Examples abound. What follows, is merely a look at the recent India-England one day series:

First ODI, Calcutta:

Sourav Ganguly and Sachin Tendulkar, the "best opening partnership in the world ever", perform thus: Ganguly 42 off 58 balls, four fours and one six; Tendulkar 36 off 43 balls, 6 fours. Of the 78 runs they score off a combined 101 deliveries, 46 runs come off just 11 scoring shots. Which means that the two best batsmen in the side have - discounting the fours - scored all of 32 runs off 90 deliveries, that is, 15 over!

Ganguly scores 22 runs off five balls - and just 20 off the other 53. Tendulkar scores 24 off just 6 balls - and 12 off the other 37.

India scores 281 off 300 legitimate deliveries - which on the face of it seems fantastic.

Minus extras, that is 261 off 300 - still very good.

But there are 29 fours and 2 sixes in the innings - in other words, 31 balls contribute 128 runs. Put differently, the team has managed just 132 runs off 269 deliveries, or 44.5 overs!

We won - so, in the euphoria induced by the slam-bang stuff, the glaring defect is not even noticed.

Second ODI, Cuttack:

Ganguly and Tendulkar open. The former scores 14 off 15 (3 fours - meaning, 12 off 3, and just 2 off the other 12). Tendulkar scores 45 off 60 (6 fours - that is, 24 off 6 balls, and 21 off the other 54 , that is, 21 off 9 overs!).

India scores 234 off 292 legit deliveries. Minus 13 extras, that is 223 off 292. There are 23 fours in the innings - that is 92 runs off 23 balls. The team has, barring boundaries, thus managed a mere 131 off 271 balls , or 45.1 overs.

Third ODI, Chennai:

Tendulkar and Sehwag produce a blistering start. Their individual stats: Tendulkar 68 off 79 (10 fours - 40 off 10, 28 off the other 69, that is, 28 off 11.1 overs!). Sehwag: 51 off 58 (8 fours - 32 off 8 balls, 19 off 50 balls).

Chasing, India scores 221 off 280 balls. Great, we win with 20 balls to spare. Minus extras, that is still 214 off 280. There are 27 fours and one six - that is 114 off 28 balls. And 100 off the other 252).

We won, didn’t we? So, as in Kolkatta, everything is forgiven. But what if this was the VB series, with bonus points applying? We would not have garnered bonus points - for why? Because the team philosophy is, four or nothing. In this innings, if you look at non - boundaries, the team has scored 100 runs off 43 overs!!

Fourth ODI, Kanpur:

India wins handily - by eight wickets, inside 30 overs. The kind of blistering performance that makes everyone forget everything else.

Sehwag and Tendulkar go ballistic. Typical - if and when India wins, it is not because of a systematic style of play, not because of a finely drilled gameplan, but because of individual brilliance. Which, by definition, cannot be planned for - a brilliant individual could just as easily fizzle out in the next game. And when that happens, the team that relies on such pyrotechnics has no answers, no Plan B.

Examine the mechanics of the win: 219 off 178 balls. 35 fours and one six - 146 runs off just 36 balls. And 73 off 142, or 73 off 23.4 overs.

It will be argued that it is churlish to keep harping on singles, in the face of such a brilliant win. But that is precisely the point -- that such brilliant wins are not, and by definition cannot be, an everyday occurence. The difference between a four and a caught behind is as thin as the edge of the bat. On some days, they fly off the middle -- but more often than not, they don't. And when the fours stop coming, the team is stumped.

Conversely, look at it another way --given India’s ability to find the boundaries , does it ever occur to the members of this team that if they ran just 25 per cent more each innings, their totals would be so huge, not even Australia stands a chance against them?

Or, since this team is more about individual performances - we can applaud 11,000 ODI runs, without simultaneously remembering that we haven’t won a single ODI tournament since 1998 - can the Gangulys, Tendulkars, Dravids, Sehwags et al imagine what their scores would be, if they ran say thrice as many singles as they hit fours? Their four-hitting skills give them a tremendous advantage, in that it pushes fielders back and puts the fielding side on the defensive -- but their failure to run singles means that they do not consistently take advantate of this.

A classic example: eEven in this innings, with no pressure whatsoever, Ganguly scores 26 off 32. He hits five fours - that is, 20 off five scoring shots. Which means, just 6 off the other 27??!! Five singles more - just five lousy singles - and he would have been going 31 off 32!

Fifth ODI, New Delhi:

This one is the real classic.

India makes 53/1 at the end of 6 overs. Tendulkar makes 18 off just 16 balls, again without doing too well on the singles front, out of that total. Sehwag looks unstoppable - in the sort of mood he was in against New Zealand in Sri Lanka.

Follows, a travesty. Ganguly, in at number three, plays out a maiden in the seventh over. The 8th over starts with a Sehwag single - followed by five more dot balls from Ganguly. England, at the end of 6 overs, was reeling, shell-shocked. By the 10th over, they had recovered their poise or, more accurately, been let off the hook.

India is 62/1 at the end of 10 overs, and following Sachin’s departure off the last ball of the 5th over, just 9 runs have come off 30 deliveries! All because one batsman could not take a single and give the strike to his partner, who was at the time batting out of his skin.

The immediate result is that Sehwag’s game falls away - and he gets out shortly thereafter, trying to regain the impetus (in the 2nd ball of the 12th over). India after 15 overs, 76/2..

In other words, after Tendulkar goes and Sehwag is shackled, the team manages 23 runs off 60 deliveries for the loss of Sehwag. Please note, these 10 overs are at a period when the field restrictions are in place.

India loses. "It is a young side, the boys are inexperienced," says Ganguly, himelf the second most experienced batsman in the side. Meanwhile, we find cause for solace - Ganguly has come back to form, glory hallelujah, check out his 74 off 95 balls.

Right, check it out: 5 fours and 3 sixes, that is 38 runs in 8 balls. The rest of the time, he manages 36 runs off 87 deliveries (14.3 overs).

India makes 269 off 300 balls. 13 extras. That is 256 off 300. 25 fours and three sixes = that is 118 off 28 balls.

The rest of the time, the team has managed 138 off 272 balls, that is, 45.2 overs!

The side lost by two measly runs!

Sixth ODI, Mumbai:

Tendulkar leaves early. Par for the course in recent times - cometh the big hour, goeth the man!

In comes Sourav Ganguly - back in form, as the pundits tell us. And produces an innings of 80 off 99 balls. Great stuff - except for the fact that there are four fours and four sixes in it.

That is, 40 runs off 8 balls. In other words, if you exclude boundaries, 40 runs off 91 balls, or 15.1 overs!

India scores 250 off 299 balls. Minus 27 extras, that is 223 off 299.

17 fours = 68 and 6 sixes = 36, that is, 104 off just 23 balls.

So how much did the team score off the remainder? 119 - off 276 balls, that is, 119 off 46 overs!

The team loses by 5 runs!

1) India has, cumulatively, lost the ability to think through the basics of cricket. Time and again, the team gets off to a frantic start - and then there is "a collapse under pressure".

Where does the pressure come from? Simply from this inability to keep rotating strike, and simultaneously, use the single as a two-pronged weapon: firstly to keep chipping away at the target, secondly to use it to upset the rhythm of the bowlers and the fielders.

Time and again, you hear the pundits on television scream "That four (or six) will have relieved the pressure!".

An amazing statement - fours and sixes in the middle overs do NOT relieve the pressure - unless you can guarantee to hit one every over. Which even India’s much-hyped strokeplayers can’t guarantee.

Fours and sixes only relieve pressure at the death, if you are facing a run a ball chase, by giving you extra deliveries in hand. In the middle overs, what relieves pressure on the batting side, and puts it on the fielding side (no fielding side panics if you hit a four every three overs - but if you take 3, 4 singles an over, watch the fielders scatter; watch also the frustrated bowler produce the gimme ball as his length and line are disrupted).

Apparently, neither our commentators, nor the players they are commenting about, are aware of this basic truth.

2) The real tragedy is, the malaise is spreading. Earlier, it was just Ganguly - and Dravid - doing this. Now, the fever has spread to Tendulkar, a brilliant runner between wickets who, of late, appears to have forgotten the art of placing the single. Worse, is this mindset of cutting out some of his best shots - like the straight hit over the bowler’s head in the early overs - and getting cute, going inside the line to play off to leg, or going just outside the line to run it down to third man. The former got him bowled once in this series, the latter got him caught behind in the fifth and sixth odis. And this is the example the younger boys have to follow.

While on examples, Ganguly is rapidly becoming a nightmare. Firstly, there are the singles he does not run - the obvious reason being a complete lack of fitness. While on the subject, shortly before the one day series against England, BCCI president Jagmohan Dalmiya had unveiled his multi-point plan for the betterment of Indian cricket.

One of his biggest articles of faith was fitness. No unfit player, no matter how senior he may be, will be considered for selection, Dalmiya insisted.

Two days after that statement, the Indian team is called for a fitness Test, ahead of the ODI series. All players -- except one -- take part. The one exception is Sourav Ganguly who, as captain, needed to set the example. Instead of which, he flat out refused to take the test.

Refusing to take a test is one thing -- but on the field, there is no escape from your shortcomings. And this particular one, fitness, comes into glaring focus when it comes to running between wickets. Thus, as mentioned earlier, there are the singles he does not take. And then there are the singles his partners are denied, because he won’t run for their shots either.

In the final ODI, when Kaif got out trying to force the pace, his coach screamed at him as he was entering the dressing room. What about that previous shot, didn't you realise that was a two, what do you mean by running just a single? 'The captain didn't want to run the second,' Kaif responded, to his coach's criticism. In public, mind you.

Ganguly might be able to make his own individual run-rates look better with the occasional fours and sixes - vide ODIs five and six, in both of which he was way behind at times, then made ground with the odd six - but his personal run rate does not help the team win chases, it merely creates an illusion that he is batting brilliantly. Meanwhile, his partner - who does not possess his ability to bridge the gap with a six or two - comes under enormous pressure, tries to hit his way out of trouble, and falls.

3) One final point: India’s inability to take singles with any consistency is no secret - if we could produce this analysis in an hour, with nothing more than a basic scorecard to help me, then international sides with heavy-duty computer analysis can go further, and pinpoint exactly which areas we score our few singles in, and where we are completely barren.

This means that the captain of an international side goes into a game feeling confident about his team's chances. His thinking will be - okay, Sehwag and Tendulkar are acts of god, if they strike, you just roll over and play dead. But that is an if - which he can to a certain extent control by the line and length his bowlers bowl. But he also thinks that it has been a long time since Tendulkar has had the legs to last beyond 15 overs. So that means that 2/3rds of the game is open.

And that 2/3rds, he can control. Because he knows that India won’t take short singles, he can use just four of his fielders to block the ones (typically, you would use a point, and a short cover, on the off, a short midwicket, and a square leg, on the on), and use the rest in more defensive settings. Contrast that with the situation when India is in the field - given the lack of footspeed in the fielders, we tend to have point, cover, mid off, mid on, midwicket, square leg, and still give away singles, while leaving us only three other fielders to cover the big hits.

The opposing captain thus knows that India will struggle for singles, and that as the runs dry up, the batsmen will play silly shots and get out - with this team, it is axiomatic, inevitable.

This is all the gameplan Hussain needed in the fifth and sixth ODIs - both of which England won. (Interesting, that India’s most fluent victory came the one time Sehwag and Tendulkar both got going - that act of God mentioned earlier, but it needs pointing out that it happened only once in six tries, and you would have to add that against teams with better new ball bowlers than this England lot, that ratio would be more like 1 in 10).

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