Pace the Music.

With India’s tour of New Zealand right around the corner, all this talk of the country’s miserable failure on the previous excursion in 2003 has come into the spotlight. Team India was outdone in every department of the game by the kiwis and besides a couple of performances from Sehwag there was nothing positive that could be taken away from the tour. But things are different now. We are a different squad, hounding for the “number one team in the world” spot with only two hurdles in the way. One is South Africa who is currently holding the pole position. The second, is that it remains to be seen whether this rejuvenated squad, under the leadership of Captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni, can cope with the speed and bounce of the wickets in New Zealand, which tortured every preceding Indian side. The pitches back home have never been speed friendly­. This is why the vast majority of sub-continental batsmen hit the wrong notes when they travel out of the tropical terrain and also the reason why most captains playing in the country opt for the additional spinner versus the paceman.

Back in Mumbai, things are stirring up as the IPL auctions have come to a close and the squad has been announced. Contrary to popular belief, the Mumbai Indians bowling line up consists largely of pace bowlers- Zaheer Khan, Lasith Malinga, Kyle Mills, Dilhara Fernando, Dwayne Bravo, Dhawal Kulkarni, the new guys – Ryan Mclaren who took a hat-trick in England’s domestic T20 final against Gloucestershire and Graham Napier whose T20 best is 3 for 13 and averages a minimal 23.86. Abhishek Nayar and Rohan Raje also turn their arms at a respectable speed. Looks like our owners really went all out in finding a replacement for veteran Shaun Pollock!

It’s tough to pin down which of these will have to sit on the bench. Zaheer will obviously lead the bowling attack. Dwayne Bravo is arguably our best all-rounder and too strong not to make it to the squad. Graham Napier, besides his bowling has scored 152 not out from 58 balls. The innings set a number of records, notably the highest individual score in a T20 innings in England, and in the domestic Twenty20 competition. Spinner- Harbhajan is also likely to start unless he gets Sreesanth singing to his tunes again and it’ll be unlikely that Abhishek Nayar is dropped after a strapping all-round performance last season and through the year. Adding to this, Surya will also bowl his usual, unfortunately leaving Malinga, Mills, Fernando, Ryan Mclaren and Kulkarni fighting for one spot. Adding to this, the team selectors are going to face the pressure of making sure that the owners’ heavy investments don’t lie latent on the bench. A rotational policy seems to be on the cards, which only a handful of teams have used successfully because the mantra has always been to stick with the winning combination so as to keep the momentum going and the spirits high. It will be interesting to see if the selectors will have to face the music when the “fat lady sings”.