How Many Coaches Are Enough?

This is the question I want to pose to some of international captains who seem to be demanding a certain type of coach, every time their respective team shows signs of lagging behind in a certain aspect of the game. Dhoni was the one who called for a full-time fielding coach along with an assistant because the pathetic fielding standards of the Indian team have now become a commonly acknowledged fact. Is it that the fielding coach is going to sprinkle some magic on 25+yr olds who have been playing this game for more than a decade and make them bend and twist along the lines of cricket’s ex-Mr. Fielding Jonty Rhodes? The Indian fielders cannot perform basic fielding actions with precision like bending down fully and collecting the ball cleanly. Is that really something for which you need a full-time, dedicated coach? Mohammed Yousuf has now demanded a batting coach because his side has stumbled twice against the average spin of Nathan Hauritz & Co. What are we supposed to believe? The Pakistani batsmen who dug out the short pitched bowling that supposed to be their nemesis but got out repeatedly to a lollypop bowler like Hauritz are going to be re-taught how to play down flighted deliveries? Seriously, we need some sense being knocked into captains who just cannot acknowledge the fact that their sides are performing badly in a certain way simply because there is lack of application. How about keeping a coach for being honest and forthright if we are already on a coach-appointing spree??

Swann & Hauritz Prove Contemporary Batsmen Can’t Handle Basic Spin

There are two ongoing test matches and both have them proved that no matter how flat the wickets are, no matter how inventive the batsmen have become and no matter how enterprising shot-making has become, one simple, fact cannot be altered — most contemporary sides cannot handle even average-quality spin bowling if it is dished out on a sustained basis.


Just look at the Pakistani side. They were supposed to struggle against the fast, Aussie bowlers but they have fallen prey to a fiver from Hauritz. No disrespect towards Nathan Hauritz, but by no means is he a match-winning Tweaker. By no means Hauritz can be described as a big spinner of the ball. He is simply a line and length, off-spinner who has the ability to stick to a line and wait for the batsmen to commit a folly and usually that doesn’t work since the pitches are so flat these days that all sorts of strange, counter strokes can be played to negate whatever little spin he is able to generate. The same applied to Kumble for a long time when he could take buckets of wicket at home because the pitches were up and down but was redundant in overseas conditions because simply pitching the ball between the stumps didn’t make an impact. The same applies to South Africa. Graeme Swann does have the talent to make the ball dip in the air but he cannot spin it an impressive extent even if his own life dependent upon it. He simply owes his wickets against South Africa to the Proteas batsmen being apprehensive on the slight indications of some, meagre turn on a wicket that is slowly wearing out.
The final result — two average spin bowlers have delivered what are potentially match-winning spells.

Aussie Bowling Riches are piling-up

The absence of a Warnie or a McGrath will always be felt, but just look at the kind of bowlers Ponting has at his disposal right now - the choice of lef-armers is seriously widespread with Bollinger, Johnson and Bracken ready to bend their backs and among the more conservative-type, line & length bowlers, Hillfenhaus is shaping-up real good and Stuart Clarke, despite his lack of pace, has the ability to come good when the going gets really tough. Add to this mix, the really fast bowlers like Brett Lee and Tait, and you have a pretty penetrative Aussie bowling attack. Yes, there are some vacancies in the spin department but Hauritz can keep-up one end really tight. I believe this pool of bowlers is good enough to win test matches on most pitches, and against every kind of opposition that is pitched against the Aussies. This makes them plenty of arsenal as they prepare for the 2011 World Cup. Further, their bowling powress should not be underestimated just because the World Cup is going to be played in the subcontinent. If you recall, some of the last few home series that India has hosted and those played in Sri Lanka, it seems that any side that has fast bowlers who can bend their backs and save about crucial runs by bowling hard into the ground, into the rib-cages of the batsmen, even in matches where 300+ is the average score are worth their weight in the team.