Sa vs Ind 2nd Test: India needs to come back at Durban

The Indians were blown away in the first Test match at Centurion by the pace of South Africa. Most of the batsmen failed to live up to the expectations of the fans and by the time the game was lost, much of the confidence had been eroded.

Kingsmead will be as bouncy. India have been bowled out for 100 and 66 in a Test match here at Kingsmead in 1996-97 and will know that the current pace attack is almost akin to that one. With Dale Steyn and Morne Morkel firing on all cylinders, it does look like things will need a huge push from the Indians to have any chance of surviving the second Test match.

Interestingly, the minor ray of hope or a silver lining in the clouds comes for India in the form of the first change bowler in Lonwobo Tsotsobe. Tsotsobe did not have a great game and it was only Morkel and Steyn who were able to get away. In the first innings, the Indian batsmen barely lasted a few deliveries each to test the first and second change bowlers too much. In the second innings, when they did target the likes of Tsotsobe, Paul Harris and Jacques Kallis, the game had been lost.

What the Indians will probably need to do is to try and see out the new ball. Very often, Virender Sehwag has given it away in the early overs and blamed it on the way he has always played. A sterling start from Sehwag has put the bowlers on the back-foot on many occasions. However, in this case, one gets the feeling that Sehwag will do well to mix caution with aggression instead of just going for everything blindly. This is because even if he comes off and scores a quick-fire 50, it does not give the rest of the batting order a chance to play with the older ball, but if he does get out early while throwing his bat around, things could get difficult.

Interestingly, Harris was allowed to get away after Sehwag gave his wicket away to him and conceded only 88 from his 30 overs. For India to be able to keep the South Africans at bay, they need to find out ways of scoring against Harris and they need not be the wham-bang way alone.

Suresh Raina’s batting will be of a grave concern. In both the innings, all that he did was to hang his bat out like he was fishing and gave a simple catch behind the wickets. There are grave questions on whether he will play, especially with the calm and collected and the technically much better, Cheteshwar Pujara breathing down his neck as well.

And that is only one aspect of the issue – the bowling had been equally inept. But that is a discussion for another day.