While India play Sri Lanka and the rain in Colombo, on what seems like another batsman obsessed pitch, the juniors are out in Australia putting in some impressive performances against their peers. Cricket never stops, does it? It only moves elsewhere!

Rarely has a nation put out such vastly different teams within days of each other as India have in Sri Lanka post the Asia Cup. Eight out of the eleven in the first Test were not present in Pakistan and that tells me two things: one, that India must possess great depth in their cricket and two, that there ought to have been some rusty players in Colombo.

But these are different days in Indian cricket and there is now a fully functional cricket academy which means that there is a facility for players who haven’t played cricket to get back into rhythm under a very good coach and fitness trainers. The NCA is, at the moment, one of the most valuable resources the BCCI could have built up. Just imagine otherwise. With the monsoon having set in, there would hardly have been any practice or training facilities around, a call would have to be sent out for volunteers. Instead, the players will be as ready for competition as they could have been.

Harbhajan gets his spot back straightaway and that is good and bad. It is a vote of confidence in his ability, which has never been doubted anyway, but it would have been nice if there had been competition forcing him to fight his way back. But there is none in Indian cricket when it comes to Test matches and that is why it might have been a better idea for the emerging nations to play three or four day games as well, for that would have told us of the quality of Piyush Chawla, Amit Mishra and Pragyan Ojha in the longer format.

... contd.