{"id":11585,"date":"2012-11-13T05:18:21","date_gmt":"2012-11-13T05:18:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/indiansportsnews.co.in\/?p=11585"},"modified":"2012-11-13T05:18:21","modified_gmt":"2012-11-13T05:18:21","slug":"the-biggest-challenge-for-england-will-be-their-focus-and-mental-commitment-for-the-series-ganguly","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/indiansportsnews.co.in\/?p=11585","title":{"rendered":"The biggest challenge for England will be their focus and mental commitment for the series: Ganguly"},"content":{"rendered":"

After the away tour of Australia, there hasn’t been quality Test cricket for India and the eight Tests between India-England-Australia will provide four months of terrific cricket, writes Sourav Ganguly in his column in Hindustan Times,<\/strong> adding that India will be happy they are playing at home, where they are always tough to beat.<\/p>\n

\u201cEngland are under a new captain in Alistair Cook and he wants to make a change in England’s performance in the sub-continent. It’s his first Test series as captain and his excitement is understandable. Cook knows he will be tested strongly by this India side and it’s not bad for a young captain to start off against a strong opposition,\u201d writes Ganguly, adding that the biggest challenge for England will be their focus and mental commitment for the series.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt’s a long tour, considering that they came here before time for three warm-up games. So the question is whether England can survive four Tests mentally.\u201d<\/p>\n

Zaheer Khan is reckoned by most teams as one of the experts with the shining as well as the old ball, says a report in The Hindu,<\/strong> adding that he has cultivated the happy knack of breaking a partnership making the reverse swing work; one of the reasons why the Indian team management must be hoping that the extremely dexterous left- arm seamer regains fitness for the exacting demands of Test cricket.<\/p>\n

\u201cMoreover he\u2019s the most experienced Indian bowler; Ishant Sharma has not exactly returned to the big league after an ankle surgery and Umesh Yadav is yet to take the big stride in international cricket,\u201d says the report, adding that the two spinners, Ravichandran Ashwin and Pragyan Ojha, have been successful in recent times against the West Indies and New Zealand, but like Yadav they have not sent down a ball to English batsmen in Test cricket.<\/p>\n

The first Test against England starts on Thursday and after a three-day camp at the Brabourne Stadium here, where he went about a prescribed training meticulously and made his lower and upper limbs work to some degree of satisfaction. \u201cThings would become clearer after he goes through the rigours at Motera.\u201d<\/p>\n

Meanwhile according to a report in The Times Of India,<\/strong> former India captain and coach Ajit Wadekar says, \u201cIn 1993, England were supposed to be a good team with Graham Gooch as captain and Duncan Fletcher as manager. We didn\u2019t absolutely get spinning wickets but we ensured we didn\u2019t let Gooch off the hook. They came well equipped but we showed them that on Indian wickets we are the king. Gooch is their batting coach now. Hope he tells the batsmen to bide their time on our wicket.\u201d<\/p>\n

Like in 1993 when Anil Kumble, Venkatpathy Raju and Rajesh Chauhan spun a web around the visiting batsmen, India will probably have a three-pronged attack in R Ashwin, Pragyan Ojha and Yuvraj Singh. Kumble picked up 21 wickets in the 1993 series. Wadekar, who witnessed it all, wished India had added a leg-spinner in the side to make it worse for the visitors. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe had a varied spin attack in the 1993 series. We had a leg-spinner, a left-arm spinner and an off-spinner. That really baffled England. Moreover, Kumble was a headstrong character. He utilised the third and fourth day wickets. He was sometimes quicker in the air, sometimes he slowed it down and sometimes he got the ball to spin the other way. His straighter ones were very quick and that was difficult to pick. That\u2019s why he got more leg before decisions as well,\u201d Wadekar reminisced.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After the away tour of Australia, there hasn’t been quality Test cricket for India and the eight Tests between India-England-Australia will provide four months of terrific cricket, writes Sourav Ganguly in his column in Hindustan Times, adding that India will be happy they are playing at home, where they are always tough to beat. \u201cEngland […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[52],"tags":[1214,1243,521,2215,7289,569],"class_list":["post-11585","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-from-the-newspapers","tag-alastair-cook","tag-anil-kumble","tag-ishant-sharma","tag-pragyan-ojha","tag-sourav-gagngult","tag-zaheer-khan"],"yoast_head":"\nThe biggest challenge for England will be their focus and mental commitment for the series: Ganguly - IndianSportsNews.com - Latest Updated Sports News & Sports Blogs of Cricket, Hockey, Golf, Football, Tennis & Other Sports<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/indiansportsnews.co.in\/?p=11585\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The biggest challenge for England will be their focus and mental commitment for the series: Ganguly - 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