Before leaving for England, the Indian head coach, Ravi Shastri had said that rather than worrying about the opposition, they will be focussed more about the 22-yard pitch. However, after the 31-run defeat at Edgbaston, the team management would know that except the four bowlers and captain Virat Kohli, the rest looked seemingly out of depth at countering the 22-yard strip.
However, at Lord’s, where the second Test starts on Thursday, more than the pitch, it’s the 8-feet slope that runs from the Nursery End to the Pavilion End that will always keep the visitors thinking. To describe the things more clearly, fast bowlers from the Pavilion End tend to get extra purchase and move the ball into right-handed batsmen more viciously because of this slope.
India’s lanky pacer Ishant Sharma, who has a nick of bowling fierce inswingers, will relish the prospect of bowling from this End. Four summers ago, he ran through the English middle order with a match-winning 7-wicket haul in the second innings. He will miss the services of Bhuvneshwar Kumar though, who scalped six in the first innings of that game. That was the first and only instance when two Indian fast bowlers got a six-for or more in the same Test, as Bhuvneshwar Kumar scalped six in the first innings.
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Despite Ishant’s exploits in 2014, during the sidelines of a camp organized for fast bowlers by the Haryana Cricket Association and MRF Pace Academy in Lahli, Glenn McGrath offered a note of caution, he said, “As a bowler, it’s not easy to get into the groove at Lord’s straightaway. Seeing the slope can sometimes get the better of you. For bowlers, the slope is a mind thing, really. On a pitch like that, it’s important to keep it simple. Hit the right area and get the ball to seam — one ball would come in, and the other would go away.”
It’s a simplistic explanation, but one that turned McGrath into a lethal match-winner at Lord’s as he scalped 26 wickets from three Tests (1997, 2001 and 2005). Recalling the same, he said, “I always preferred bowling from the Pavilion End. The natural variation of the ground helped me. I think Ishant will also prefer to bowl from that End, using his height and getting the ball to either come back in or hold its line. Give me the Dukes ball any day and I will be the happiest bloke. When I play matches with it, my average was six-and-a-half wickets per Test match while with the Kookaburra, it would be 4-and-a-half.”
Talking about the Dukes ball further, former Australia pacer noted that the Dukes had a more pronounced seam than the Australian Kookaburra and even aided reverse swing, sometimes as early as in the 12th over.
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The Kookaburra balls losing potency in recent times on flat decks, but McGrath reckons that it creates challenge for a cricketer, he said, “Playing with Dukes in Australia would have been like Christmas, but I think it makes you a better cricketer if you can bowl with all three — Dukes, Kookaburra, and SG Test. That is the beauty and challenge of playing Test cricket wherein players can adapt to these vastly different types of balls.”
India’s bowling attack was ferocious at Edgbaston and that was a great testimony that the visiting bowlers have adapted to the Dukes ball. Now, it’s about getting acclimatized to the natural variation at Lord’s.
