Raina ton furthers Indian title quest

Harsha Bhogle reviews Sunday’s games where the big guns played each other in the World Twenty20 2010.

While Suresh Raina had always looked good in the IPL and in subcontinent kind of conditions, I had been waiting for him to produce something substantial on a wider stage. He did that against South Africa and it was so good to watch. A century in T20 cricket is always special but this needs closer examination.

First, the quality of the attack. Good seamers not averse to digging the ball in. Early morning pitch which was a bit sticky and so the ball didn’t come on too well. Long boundaries, so a six had to be a really good hit, not one of those mis-hits that carry on some grounds. And the outfield in the morning was so sluggish that drives were going for two and the nudge behind the wicket would never produce a boundary.

It creates a different kind of pressure if you are used to the scoreboard moving along at a certain rate. Here you could play five good shots and get eight! That is why I believe in IPL-like conditions, this innings would have been worth 130.

I’m not sure the idea of using four spinners worked. To be honest, I had been an advocate of that kind of approach. It seemed good initially when the spinners bowled tight spells but once the need for acceleration became greater they went for a lot of runs and ended up producing a par economy rate. Part of the reason could be that while the wicket was slow in the morning, it didn’t have much turn in it so once you got used to the slowness you could score runs quite freely.

For me, Pakistan were a disappointment. They still look a good balanced side but have such a complex about playing Australia. Not sure they can win and it needs someone to do something out of the box to regain any confidence at all. They should go through and much will depend from here on the pitches in Barbados where most of the Super 8 games are being played. Hope they have enough pitches on the square!