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Ricky Ponting has conceded Australia’s injury troubles and less-than-ideal training facilities have provided a mixed start to their World Cup campaign. The defending champions will have only 12 players to choose from for their first warm-up match, against Zimbabwe on Tuesday.The teams are allowed to use 13 men for the practice games but of Australia’s 15, Andrew Symonds has an arm injury, Matthew Hayden has a broken toe and Adam Gilchrist has not yet joined the squad after the birth of his third child. Ponting said his side’s fitness and form – they lost the No. 1 ODI ranking to South Africa in February – were far from ideal.”Look, there are some concerns there, no doubt about that, ” Ponting told . “I don’t think any more than normal. It’s about all of us just looking at our own games and finding little areas that we think we can improve. If we play our best cricket, we are going to be very hard to beat.”Ponting said John Buchanan had just inspected the facilities in St Vincent, where Australia are based, and had raised some issues. “I’m not sure if we’re going to get too much good practice in over the next couple of days,” Ponting said.”If we don’t, it’s not a great concern. We just have to get out there and make the most of what we have got. We have been here to the Caribbean before and places [where] you don’t always get the practice facilities you want.”Australia are still discussing the make-up of their frontline bowling attack for the tournament and a four-man pace battery remains a possibility. Australia tested that tactic at the Champions Trophy in India and won the competition. However, their fast bowlers tailed off at the end of the CB Series and in the Chappell-Hadlee Trophy, raising questions over Australia’s ability to defend big totals.”I’m not that concerned,” Ponting said. “It was only a few weeks ago that this exact same bowling attack was bowling teams out for a hundred. We’re just going to have to pick the team that we think is going to be best suited to the conditions here. We’ve got re-laid wickets and early-morning starts here so you’ve got to take all that into account.”Buchanan said in the he had asked the advice of Andy Atkinson, the ICC’s pitch consultant, who had overseen the preparation of the grounds. “His opinion is basically the wickets will start pretty true, even pace, even bounce pretty well throughout,” Buchanan said. “There may be some change in the wickets as the tournament goes along.”

India are counting their riches. They made a bold statement in Mohali by going in with five bowlers even though, essentially, only two in Munaf Patel and Anil Kumble had the woods on the England batsmen.Patel’s emergence points to an India where talents are sprouting in far-away fields. They are hungry and competitive, skilled and mature beyond their years. They have control and confidence and are more than just one-trick ponies. Suddenly, there is a scramble for places in the bowling department.It would encourage the team management to do a ditto with their batting. Wasim Jaffer has made a statement of intent in the first two Tests and in laying off the likes of VVS Laxman and Sourav Ganguly, the message is loud and clear for the rest. A Sachin Tendulkar is still out of reach but a Virender Sehwag has caught the hint palpably. Informed ones must tell me if they have ever seen Sehwag apply himself in such a manner as he did on the last day in Mohali. He got one of his rare good scores in the second innings and what is more it could perhaps be his slowest fifty in Test cricket. All that talk of leave-him-alone and ‘he knows only one way to bat’ has been tossed out of the window. The sense of self-preservation can make the best of us do strange things.And finally to a man who played his first Test against me in Manchester in 1990. Anil Kumble was an unorthodox sight to us which was bemusing since India also had a regular conventional spinner in Narendra Hirwani. When I brought the side to India in 1993, he had started to feature a lot in our strategic discussions in the team meetings. From those days, it would appear he has not stopped evolving.England froze in Mohali because they realised they no longer can treat him as an incoming medium pacer. He was giving the ball a loop and his leg-breaks were turning. He seems to have finally got the one thing which has missed him all his career. In its absence, he relied on developing his googlies, variations in pace, and even clever use of crease. Now if the leg break has come to stay, Kumble could be good for 600 wickets and more!England went away from Mohali wondering if they could ever raise a 400-plus total in this series. That’s the only thing which brings their pacers into the equation. Or it’s a free slide. Batting, as they say, is now elementary for England. The ghosts of Marcus Trescothick and Michael Vaughan are very much around. Nagpur now is so far away.For a side determined to engage India in attritional warfare, England’s collapse in Mohali was startling. It would bring to question their ability to stay focused in the subcontinent for more than a week. They appeared too soft, too fragile in conditions which were anything but hot and dusty. Besides, the pitch was on the batters’ side and one-third of the overs were not played.England, distressingly, do not have much option in dressing up their batting line-up. But fiddle they must in Mumbai, for neither Ian Blackwell nor Liam Plunkett have appeared an option at number eight – the spot where Anil Kumble has made such a critical difference with bat in both Nagpur and Mohali. It would mean that for the first time since the Ashes, their five-bowler theory would go for a toss.Four seamers and a spinner has pretty much been England’s ploy in the recent past but now it would not work. They need batting reinforcements but beyond Owais Shah, there is not much choice. They might feel it would leave their bowling a little under-cooked in Mumbai but that is not true for Blackwell and Plunkett were hardly seen at the bowling crease in the two Tests.Still, England are now retreating into their shell and it magnifies the crime of the batters. Andrew Strauss, after all these weeks in Pakistan and India, has still not worked out his methods for the subcontinent. Kevin Pietersen, for all his talent, appears almost desperate to attack and spinners love such characters. He wants to dictate terms even before he has got his eyes in.Ian Bell has an issue with concentrating for long hours which, ironically, till now has been seen his strength. The Paul Collingwood we saw in Mohali was different to the one who seemed to have sparked off an England revival in Nagpur. As for Alastair Cook, well, the kid can be spared a harsh word so early in his career.

Inzamam-ul-Haq has received a one-Test ban for showing dissent against umpiring decisions on the last day of the Bangalore Test.Saleem Altaf, the Pakistan team manager, clarified that Inzamam had been pulled up for two instances of misconduct. “We had a hearing with the match referee, Chris Broad, for two counts of excessive appealing and dissent. On the first count, he has been fined 30% of his match fees and on the second, a level two offence, he has been given a one-Test ban.”Pakistan ended up winning the match by 168 runs, but Inzamam was visibly miffed when a couple of caught-behind appeals against the Indian openers were denied on the first session. Gautam Gambhir was lucky to survive – the snickometer clearly showed contact between bat and ball – but the decision in favour of Virender Sehwag seemed a good one. Inzamam was especially upset after Sehwag was ruled not out, charging past the batsman and shaking his hands in anger.Altaf indicated that the Pakistan board would take a decision on whether or not to appeal against the verdict. If the decision stays, then Inzamam will have to sit out of Pakistan’s first Test on their tour of the West Indies.

Steve Bucknor has rejected criticism of his umpiring during the first Test between Australia and India at Brisbane, especially his controversial leg-before decision against Sachin Tendulkar in India’s first innings.And Bucknor, long regarded as one of the best umpires in the world, dismissed suggestions that his form was on the wane. “Just recently I was umpiring the World Cup final so I don’t understand what is happening, but at the moment I am pretty comfortable with my form,” he told the Australian Associated Press. “The criticism doesn’t bother me. Mistakes are going to be made. I know that. Everyone makes mistakes including myself.”The plethora of television replays indicated the ball which trapped Tendulkar would have sailed over the top of the stumps. But Bucknor delivered his verdict – described by the media in terms such as “a disgrace” and “an insult” – after his customary long deliberation.”I give myself enough time to think about my decision, to replay just about everything about that delivery, and by so doing I should in the end be able to make that [correct] decision,” he explained. While refusing to discuss the Tendulkar decision itself, he added, “Sometimes it doesn’t go that way … it’s not because my brain is working slowly. Once the hit is made I have a fair idea of what my decision is it’s a matter of seeing whether something else could have happened.”Although the Tendulkar dismissal was the one which grabbed the headlines, Bucknor was also criticised for other decisions during the match. He gave Australia’s batsmen the benefit of the doubt on three well-justified appeals, and also appeared to mistakenly reprieve Akash Chopra for what looked like a good bat-pad catch shortly after Tendulkar’s wicket.

It’s ironic that a year that began with India celebrating a new openingcombination has ended with them grappling over the choice of their top two. Anage-old problem appeared to be sorting itself out but now it’s exploded into theirfaces.The New Year Test in Cape Town sawDinesh Karthik open for the first time and, with six 50-plus scores in six Tests,took up the role like a duck would to water. Karthik was India’s highestrun-getter in the series in England and, along with Wasim Jaffer, went aboutsetting the base for tall totals. Often it wasn’t just a platform, it was aterminus.Karthik’s poor form during the Pakistan series caused a few ripples before YuvrajSingh’s magnificent 169 in Bangalore caused what Anil Kumble termed a”happy headache”. After precisely one more Test that’s looking more like amigraine right now.A lot has happened over the last month or so: Karthik fell cheaply in his fourinnings as opener against Pakistan, Yuvraj cracked hundred, Virender Sehwag, in poor domestic form, was picked in the squad toAustralia on a hunch, Rahul Dravid, going through a lean phase, was asked to open,Dravid endured an agonising first innings at Melbourne, didn’t score much in thesecond dig, and, India lost heavily. To add to their worries Wasim Jaffer, whokept scoring through all the early turbulence, also fell early in both his chancesin Melbourne.”If you look at our batting order then all seven of them are batting well,”Kumble said of the line-up picked for the first Test, “and the other two openers, whocould have possibly taken someone else’s place, weren’t really getting runs. It isa difficult position for me. If Viru and Dinesh Karthik were in great form thenthe choice would have been easier.”It’s a hard choice for a captain but it’s a strange statement too. Karthik hasbeen off-colour since the Pakistan series and Sehwag has made more headlines forhis failures rather than successes on the domestic circuit. Both were picked, it’sbeen suggested, thanks largely to Kumble’s backing. As a captain he would haveexpected this situation.Neither were played in the tour match – probably because the first XI was decidedby then anyway – and were largely left to face the bowling machine. India wereleft with no choice but to push Dravid up to open. Kumble said as much. “WhenYuvraj is playing so well and we don’t pick him, you say why not? Then when we putRahul up the order and then make way for Yuvraj, you say ‘no you shouldn’t havedone that’. There are always ifs and buts, but for me personally I need to lookat the team dynamics and who is batting well.”Back-to-back Tests mean the team has little time to brainstorm. The SCG pitchappears to hold the key to their opening plans. Mitchell Johnson spoke about a”slow” pitch he had played on “not too long ago” but also added that he doesn’texpect a similar pitch for the Test. There has been talk of the surface being abit bouncier than normal, allowing the Australian pace bowlers an advantage.If India see some good pace and carry on the surface, there would be a temptationto play Sehwag. It won’t be a decision based on any logic but an outrightshoot-in-the-dark gamble. It might be a spectacular flop but could, with chunks ofluck, turn into a masterstroke. Kumble, who is normally known to be one to coverall bases, isn’t someone who has relied on a gambler’s instinct. He might still wantto play it safe, hoping for the same seven to fire, but he would surely be temptedto attempt the punt. You wouldn’t bet on it but a new year is supposed to beabout surprises.