India win but not before Ashraful's swan-song

Let me begin from Day2, when the painful, excruciatingly slow Sachin resumed. His innings was a torture and he laboured through the day, without ever dominating or looking like to dominate. The only decent act he did was to hand over the strike 3 times in an over before lunch, for Karthik to get his 100. Sachin's innings, as noted in the comments below by Ram, was uninspiring and I guess that he will get an uneventful string of low scores in England or score when it may not matter much. Dhoni injected some much needed life into the innings and Dravid could declare at last. I have seen too many sedate Indian 100s whch had ruined the possibility of a result, over the years and I was fearful of one more but B'desh by then had other ideas.
When India bowled, the B'deshi batsmen had the unerring liking for the pavilion and I don't blame them, after seeing the conditions. The side had lost 5 before the end of day's play and India for their part dropped 4 catches. Karthik showed them how butterfingered he can get and Powar displayed his lack of enthu for fielding.
When day 3 began, it was a question of how long B'desh could last but when Zaheer started with a wicket in the 1st over, it was all over too quick for B'desh. Zaheer had redeemed himself after a poor show in Worldcup, ODIs and the 1st test. RP never looked like threatening and the dream ball, he bowled to hapless Basheer, should have a hit wide crack. I watched the debutant Ishant with some interest and from 1st looks - another trundler with not much of movement to boot.
The 2nd innings was going the same way before Ashraful decided to show them how it should be done. He was at the press conference the previous day, promising a better show and the way, he hooked, pulled, drove, one could see loads of talent. If he could have carried on, Richard's fastest century was under threat but Kumble did the rescue act for Dravid and India could avoid the blushes, until Morteza began freeing up his arms and clouting those 4s and 6s. The fielding got worse and in all, India should have dropped a dozen in 2 innings (nothing new of course). They wanted to compete with the West Indian side for the worst fielding award. The lack of quick strikes ensured that Morteza could muster up another 50. In the end, the only positives for India - Zaheer getting back to some form and some show of promise by Karthik in batting.

Sedate Indian batsmen & Selfish Intent

It is definitely worth comparing the two 1st day's play scores of Ind-Bang and Eng-WI games (both 2nd tests). B'desh and WI are both having horrendous bowling attacks but the weather conditions were definitely worse at Dhakka. Eng managed 360 off of 85 overs but India could muster only 320 odd off 90 and that too after 2 fresh pair of legs replacing the retired hurt Jaffer and Karthik. In my opinion, India ended up a full 100 runs short of where there should have been, considering the nature of the wicket and the regulatory 2 full tosses per over dished by Raffique.
Jaffer was so scared, after the pair in the 1st test, he had asked the make shift Karthik to take 1st strike. Jaffer's selfishness was evident all through the innings, when he refused to run for Karthik's attempts to take sharp singles. In fact, he hogged the strike for a full 4 overs, when Karthik was scoring, virtually a 4 every 4 balls. Karthik, too struggled before lunch but made amends later. But, the worst scrating around was done by Sachin - he was selfishness personified. 9 off 40 balls, when he should have hit 70 to 80 in those 40, since by then B'desh bowlers were feeling like German soldiers in WWII in Stalingrad - completely spent; they were begging for rest and were collapsing around balls while fielding but for Sachin, every record counts - he never bothered about the team's intent to push things and hence played one scratchy shot after another. Dravid was decent of all but he too should learn to score at run a ball, especially against such attacks and such pitches. One can argue that the conditions were tought but believe me - it is far, far tough to bowl and field than bat in such conditions. So, what lies ahead - well !! another painful period of endurance where there will be accumulations and a delayed declaration sometime on the 3rd day...then, it will be upto the bowlers, but I guess in this wicket, even school boys can bat out 3 days.

What is ahead for India in England?

The way BCCI had managed the telecasting, majority of folks in Urban India can enjoy Eng-WI test match (in crystal clear, vivid) ESPN as opposed to India's own test match Vs B'desh. With the Neosports being out of reach for most cable operators, the only alternative was to hope for DD to telecast but they never did (in fact, DD sports choose to show SL-Pak match from AbuDhabi) since DD has an aversion to the real cricket - test matches; it does not bring in the same moolah as the ODI, where you can show cricket between ads and also roll in ads to about 50% of the screen during the over.
Anyway, I got to watch Mat Prior's innings (along with Kevin Pieterson and Cook, Collingwood's 100s) and the 1st conclusion I had - India will have a tough time, when they go to England in a few weeks. India, traditionally had difficulties with the opposing lower order and Prior & co will be waiting with their bats. India is yet to figure out the opening combination (in fact, except for a brief period of Gavaskar- Chauhan and Mustaq Ali- Lala Amarnath), they are yet to figure that in 70 odd years. With the twin failures of Jaffer and the make shift Karthik, not sure about keeping that slot in greener pitches, it is back to square one. My guess, the batting will come thro' somehow - they will struggle initially but by the 2nd test or so - the English summer wickets will be easy to play and Indian batting will survive, if not excel (all they have to do is to avoid loosing the 1st test). But, the bowling will be another story - it will be an episode of gift wrappers at best - wait for Strauss..all the way to Panesar to feast on the innocuous dollies from the 3 Indian pacemen. It will one high score after another for the English bats.
Then, there is ..hold your breadth- 7 ODIs, in traditional English cricket and with some of them even D/N. Hmmm..Here too England must be waiting to revive its fortunes thanks to the hapless and clueless India.

No Pains !! No Gains !!

It was another half baked effort from the Indian team and when rain intervened for the most part, the damp squib became a foregone conclusion at Chittacong's 1st test. I am not sure, who had the brains to schedule a test at this city in the 1st place but whoever did, never took the buckets and sheets of rain, which comes around in these parts. India could have still forced the issue with some imaginative batting and more important some useful bowling but they looked like a bottom the barrel, plate group Ranji side at best.
There were the usual 100s and all but considering the quality of opposition and the nature of the pitch, they should have scored the same runs at 3/4th of the time (say at 5.5 an over or something there abouts). But, the worst was the horrendous bowling. All summer, Morteza has been threatening with his fireworks in match after match; but Indian think tank decided to press on a lackluster Powar and the ill directed shoddy stuff from VRV; the end result - B'desh should have been bundled under 100 but went on to score 200+.
When India batted the 2nd time around, they batted without a plan and kept loosing wickets..the same poor effort in the bowling front was repeated in the 2nd innings by India - the only difference being, they showed the world - how low they can go. All in all, another lost opportunity to engineer a result and another test victory chance abroad missed out due to complete lack of imagination and execution. So, can the 2nd test be any different - I doubt - India simply lacks the will and most important 'urgent push' and each player seems to be interested in his record books alone.

Gambhir comes thro' (At last !!)

Gautam Gambhir was frustrating his followers and himself by being a LBW bunny and was unable to cement his place, even after a 4 year span that began at the same B'desh, when India toured after their 2003 WC campaign. The conditions were ideal - docile pitch, friendly bowling and most important - 60% of bowling by spinners. All Gambhir had to do was to overcome the heat and humidity and the rest was easy. Gautam always played the spinners with ease in domestic cricket (unlike Yuvi) and hence it was relatively easy for him to pick the 3 left armers. Viru threw it off once again and Yuvi fell to another spinner (so, what is new?). India managed 285 but a good 15-20 short of where they should have been.
Once Tanim got out, B'desh was never in the hunt. There were the odd bright spots - like the 4 sixers by Morteza but that is that and B'deshis were not in the reckoning for most part. I watched Piyush's bowling with keen interest and thankfully DD allowed Bruce Yardley, the former Australian spinner's English commentary (otherwise, it was Rajender Amarnath's Hindi speak for most part and it was common place, as usual). Yardley said that the rotations and the arm speed Piyush imparts is not comparable to that of Murali or Warne. After he made this point, I watched keenly and yep, he was right. Piyush is a work in process and has a long way to go, before reaching such levels. He has a decent googly but his spin is not the baffling type. He also floats too many and will go for a few, if one uses his feat a bit more. Anyway, India took a win but I am not impressed since if some one is kidding me that this is India's future bowling plan - my 2 cents - won't fly far, even against the next level of cricketing nations.

Fumble and Tumble - Lackluster win !!

If someone had suggested last year, that an India Vs Bangladesh ODI match will assume this much of significance, the response would have been 'have your mind examined'; but, after the WC 1st round exit by India (thanks to B'desh) and the new make over, there was some interest to find out what is going to happen. Things started off rather badly - Manoj Tiwary, the one young talent, everyone wanted to test out had injured his shoulder, as soon as the team reached Dhaka and before that media reports had put that the so called camp @ Kolkatta was a swing back to the yesteryears - when the players went thro' motions and a few knocks here and there.
This is obviously not the ideal time to play ODIs with energy sapping conditions but such common sense had long before gone out of the window from the gang which runs the game and counts the bucks. Then, there was the usual DD telecast, where a flickering, faded color image that appeared for the best part of 3-4 balls and over (mind you; there was no flicker in the commercials). One might ask what is new - practically nothing - missed catches, mindless bowling and some new talent pouncing on innocous offerings doled out by Zaheer - things were the same. On a day, when Dinesh Mongia emerges as your best bowler, one wonders whether Indian cricket is going in which direction. B'desh mopped up 250 in 47 thanks to a gift of about 30-40 runs on the field and some useless bowling by Viru, Zaheer and Powar. Indian fielding was atrocious as usual and the ball was routinely escorted to the boundary, perhaps fearing that a 4 is better than allowing B'desh to run 5, in case if the ball is not let go.
When India batted, things were the same - Viru - perhaps not shackled by the omnipresent GC, unleashed a few shots here and there but in no time, India was starring down the barrel with Yuavaraj failing again to lame spinner. Dhoni, hobbling on one leg gutted it out with Karthik but the end result was a painful win that cleared none of the doubts prevailing over the form and class of Indian cricket and cricketers.