Jadeja's ton marks day one of warm-up game in Guyana

Prem Panicker

As a cricketing contest, there is really nothing to the four day game between the Indian touring party and Guyana at the Bourda, which began on Friday.

But as an indicator of things to come when India and the West Indies meet, on April 17, in the fifth and final Test of the ongoing Cable and Wireless Series, this game has its points of interest.

The track at the Bourda, in Georgetown, Guyana, is flat, brown and stingless - so much so that Ajay Jadeja, coming out to bat after acting skipper Mohammad Azharuddin took first strike after winning the toss, wore a floppy white hat rather than the more usual helmet.

The track on which this game is being played runs parallel to the one that will be used for the fifth Test. And indications are that when India meets West Indies on April 17, it will be on a similar wicket, offering nothing at all for pace bowlers and holding out, more interestingly, the prospect of spin by the third day.

Jadeja, meanwhile, revelled on a wicket on which batsmen prepared to come onto the front foot could play their strokes comfortably. Chancing his arm from the word go, Jadeja drove at everything pitched up and slashed at deliveries outside the stumps, racing to 106 off 162 balls with 14 fours before becoming the second wicket to fall, with the Indian score at 162/2.

Earlier Navjot Singh Sidhu, now recovering from another of his rather mysterious illnesses, pottered around for a good 37 minutes before square cutting a rising delivery from McGarrell straight into the hands of Reon King at point with the Indian score at 19 and his own personal score at 2.

Sidhu's departure, however, marked the beginning of a long, hard grind for the Guyanese bowlers, as Saurav Ganguly and Jadeja, both stroking freely on both sides of the wicket, put on 143 for the second wicket. Ganguly went on to make 90 runs before pulling Guyanese captain Shivnaraine Chanderpaul, making his debut as skipper in this game, straight to deep bacward square leg to be held on the fence by Andre Percival.

Ganguly's innings included 10 fours and a six and came off 184 balls. But well as he batted, he and the Indian management will find cause for concern in the fact that he seems these days to make a habit of getting out when well set. In the warm-up games on tour thus far, Ganguly has scored 82 not out, 10, 73 not out and now 90. More worrying, though, is that Ganguly yet again fell pulling to backward square. In recent innings, it has been either this shot - which gets him into trouble because he tends to get under the ball and lift it, rather than rolling his wrists over the ball - or the slash to the slips, that has got him out. Ganguly needs to do some thinking about this, if only to get back into his habit of playing the big innings.

Venkat Laxman, who batted well in the only Indian innings of the rain-ruined fourth Test, however did his prospects for the fifth Test a bit of no good when he was out, caught at slip, off the first ball he faced. However, Azharuddin blazed a rapid 59 - his highest score on this tour so far - with eight boundaries before getting out caught and bowled by Roen King, the pick of the Guyanese bowlers.

At close on the first day, Robin Singh was unbeaten on 26, and keeper Saba Karim was not out on one in an Indian score of 293 for five.

India preferred to rest several senior players, going in to the game without Rahul Dravid, Sachin Tendulkar, Nayan Mongia, Anil Kumble and Venkatesh Prasad. Robin Singh, Saba Karim and Noel David got their chance, and of the troika, it will be the performance of young David that will be watched with utmost interest when Guyana takes its turn with the bat.

The Bourda wicket for the fifth Test giving every sign that it will favour spin, David looks a cert to get his first Test cap in the event he bowls decently here. Sunil Joshi, the other contender for the spinner's berth, has been getting wickets but, at the same time, has given too many free hits with his excessive flight. And this may go against him - on a track like the Bourda where run making is likely to be difficult, the last thing India's think tank will want is a bowler who conceedes two many hittable deliveries.

India, needing to win at Guyana to square the series, would be even better served going in with three spinners at the expense of an extra batsman - but that is the kind of risk the team management has seemed very reluctant to take thus far.

For now, though, all this remains in the realm of speculation, and a better idea of the team composition will be obtained once David turns his arm over in the Guyana innings and gives us a basis on which to assess his form. If he proves unimpressive, then India's best option could well be to retain Laxman as an opener, using Joshi and Kumble as the main spinners and Laxman as the part-time offie.

But more of that later...