They splashed around — not far from a bevy of beauties wanting to join them — but soon they cut short their session and joined the rest of the team at ‘Nicks’ — a popular food bar for lunch.

“Yesterday the whole team stayed in the hotel and a lot of things were happening, they wanted some change. It is important for them to relax, so that we can get our focus back,” said Lalchand Rajput.

And the time spent on the beach seemed to have worked. The smiles were back again, But the seething anger among the Indian players remain just below the surface — the anger against Ricky Ponting and some other the Australian players for the way they conducted themselves during and after the second Test. And their resolve was evident every time the Harbhajan issue cropped up. Harbhajan was at the beach too, serving well for his side in the game and defending successfully too.

India are now looked upon as heroes fighting injustice. Everyone here has been congratulating the players, the support staff, and even the media personnel here for coming out with such a strong stance. People from all walks of life expressed a lot of emotions for the team. A whopping 83 per cent of the local people here replied ‘yes’ to the question if Ricky Ponting is a bad ambassador to the game while 79 per cent admitted that Australia showed bad sportsmanship during the Sydney Test.

And among all the talk and controversy and speculations, little cricket in being played. Wonder what the next tourist destination would be for Team India.