Colombo: There was a sense of déja vu when opener KL Rahul shouldered arms to Dhammika Prasad’s break-backer to find the ball trim his bails. It was not just the petrified grimace of the batsman — seldom do batsmen look as horrendously foolish as when they perish this way — but more ominously, the pattern of India losing an opener in the first over of an innings. This is the third successive instance of India losing a wicket in the first over.
To frame it the other way, Prasad has dismissed an Indian opener thrice in the first over of an innings. In the first outing at P Sara, Murali Vijay was nailed in front by a nip-backer off the fourth ball. In the next innings, it was Rahul’s turn, undone by a ball that shaped back to brush his inside edge onto the stumps. Here again, it was an identical delivery, though the grassy surface facilitated late movement into him. It surely isn’t a frame Rahul would want to replay over and again — his front foot hardly across to cover the line of the ball and the back foot that seemed stuck in cement.
Rahul’s transition from the domestic rigours to the international arena has thus far looked seamless, but the method of dismissal only reinforced the fact that he still has a few rough edges to mend. Admitted batting coach Sanjay Bangar: “He’s been playing in the domestic circuit for a while now, and there the ball doesn’t do much after pitching. With the Kookaburra ball, it does a lot after pitching. It is something that he is getting used to. We are working on a particular aspect of his batting, and I think we will be able to sort it out quickly.”
But a bigger concern would be the Indian openers’ inability to stitch together a meaningful partnership in the series. The best they have managed in this series is 14 — in the first innings at Galle. Subsequent scores read 12, 4, 3 and 2, which means that the openers have managed just 35 runs in the entire series. And these are not English-like conditions where the ball hems around in the first session.
Ironically, two of the four openers have struck hundreds in the series, while another reeled off a brisk 82. But by some strange design — as if someone was sticking pins onto a voodoo doll — the soloists couldn’t perform a duet. Obviously, it hasn’t helped that India were forced to open with three different combinations in as many Tests — Dhawan/Rahul in Galle, Rahul/Vijay at P Sara, and Rahul/Cheteshwar Pujara at the SSC. How inopportune injuries to regulars Vijay and Dhawan — their last stand harmonising 283 runs — have rendered the team frail at the top. But how premature were the brags of opening riches.
Closer inspection reveals that even the Vijay-Dhawan association has been bloated by the bullying of lesser teams. In Australia, the best they strung together was 55. In total, they managed only 200 runs in six innings. In England, they whittled out a mere tally of 176 runs in six innings before Dhawan made way for Gautam Gambhir. In South Africa and New Zealand, they combined just 138 runs in eight innings.
However, in this series as well they were revived by credible partnerships for either the second wicket or the third, but always involving one opener. In the first inning in Galle, Kohli and Dhawan put on 227 for the third wicket; at P Sara, Kohli and Rahul stitched 164 runs for the third wicket in the first innings while Vijay and Rahane orchestrated 140 runs for the second wicket. “I would rather see that there are other partnerships at the top,” Bangar said.
If India are to pile on a reasonable first-innings total that could furnish them ascendancy in the deciding Test, they need the unbeaten pair of Pujara and Kohli batting deep into the second day. Rain willing.