Until recently, history tilted towards Pakistan

Rahul Bhatia and Bhavika Jhaveri02-Mar-2005Until recently, history in these matches tilted towards Pakistan. India, to start with, had only two series victories to Pakistan’s four. Javed Mianded still tops the batting charts. Kapil Dev, though he leads Imran Khan by five in the wickets tally, played six more Tests and averages six more runs per wicket. In many ways, the encounter – the really tough fight – rarely ever happened. Purely in terms of victory and defeat, the closest margins of voctory have been by 12, 16 and 46 runs. And Pakistan won all three.VictorMarginVenueSeriesPakistan12 runsMadras1998-99Pakistan16 runsBangalore1986-87Pakistan46 runsCalcutta1998-99Then things took an interesting turn. A more aggressive India visited Pakistan and won for the first time in 12 presidential terms. Walls had crumbled by then, an empire had fallen; 12 terms is a time in politics, as well as cricket. That brings us to this series, where Pakistan’s pace attack, a feature of India’s nightmares in past years, is scant but eager, and India’s batting is on the upswing after a bare season, except for a spurt of runs against Bangladesh.PlayerMatchesWktsAvgeS/R5/10wShoaib Akhtar41926.7838.305/0Mohammad Sami3944.6667.60/0Danish Kaneria53030.6657.33/1Abdul Razzaq4846.8790.51/0Shoaib Malik311262160/0Naved-ul-Hasan264570.80/0PlayerMatchesRunsAvgeAvge – Bang series50/100Virender Sehwag858448.6651.732/2Gautam Gambhir530743.8526.601/1Yuvraj Singh24715.66N/A0/0Rahul Dravid850850.8043.503/1Sachin Tendulkar640958.4220.831/1Sourav Ganguly631545.0031.203/0VVS Laxman821119.1818.881/0Mohammad Kaif315330.60N/A2/0Only one name from the present stands among the 20 best in these encounters. The ten most prolific batsmen still read like a list of recollections, but among the bowlers is Anil Kumble, whose ten wickets at the Feroz Shah Kotla in 1999 accelerated his rise to the league of prolific wicket-takers. This absence of modern names is due to the low frequency of series. Since Rahul Dravid and Sourav Ganguly made their debut in 1996, they have played Pakistan only twice. Over a similar period, from 1978 to 1987, the teams met in six series.PlayerMatchesWktsAvgeS/R5/10wKapil Dev299930.1260.047/1Imran Khan239424.0454.026/2Wasim Akram124528.8765.072/0Fazal Mahmood144424.5582.614/1Mahmood Hussain143933.1579.642/0Anil Kumble63722.7044.543/1Who rises above themselves in these games packed with hopes and tensions? Who falls? Chandu Borde’s average rose by more than double. Zaheer Abbas’s rise signalled the end of India’s spin quartet, for his plunder reached its apogee in 1978-79, when he accumulated 583 runs at 194.33. His average jumped from 44.8 to 87. Sachin Tendulkar’s average, on the other hand, falls by 17.44 in India-Pakistan contests.PlayerCareer avgeAvge in India-Pak gamesDifferenceChandu Borde35.5982.5046.91Zaheer Abbas44.8087.0042.20Anshuman Gaekwad30.0864.4334.35Sachin Tendulkar57.4440.00-17.44VVS Laxman43.1326.20-16.93Inzamam-ul-Haq48.9734.67-14.30Both teams have their own favourite mode of dismissing the opponents. India’s has been to let the fast bowlers do a bit and throw the spinners at ’em, while Pakistan, gifted with as many legendary pacemen as India has spinners, chose to use spinners in between. For India, using spinners to the hilt was a good idea: compared to the first innings, they gave away 17 runs fewer for every wicket in the second innings. Pakistan, on the other hand, have tended to press on with fast bowlers regardless of the innings.Pace/spin (P/S) overs bowledP/S wktsP/S avgP/S strike rate1st innings2709/3586232/19734.98/43.0570.06/109.222nd innings832/141873/11335.26/27.2268.38/75.29Pace/spin (P/S) overs bowledP/S wktsP/S avgP/S strike rate1st innings3787/1910328/12030.70/42.6869.27/95.502nd innings1493/1042117/6934.63/36.9676.56/90.61So it is unsurprising then that Pakistan’s fast bowlers have dismissed top orders and tailenders more frequently than their spinners. But India’s main weapon, the ubiquitous spinner, has been less successful dismissing Pakistan’s top order than the fast men.India pace/spinPakistan pace/spinTop order (1-6)211/191287/115Lower order (7-11)94/119158/74