An abject surrender

Will that miracle happen? Eleven balls later, long after the rampaging Makhaya Ntini had sliced open the middle order, the answer was clear: Team India simply didn’t deserve that miracle.

Umpire Asad Rauf had raised the finger to deliver the knockout blow after the ball brushed Sreesanth’s shoulder on its way to wicketkeeper Boucher. India were demolished for 179 and humiliated by 174 runs. They couldn’t even take up Boucher’s challenge last evening that South Africa would wrap it up in 50 overs — India lasted just 42.1.

In the end, all skipper Rahul Dravid had to offer was this one, simple line: “We just didn’t play well.” Of course, he was putting it mildly there. For, on a day when they just needed to play out the overs because there “wasn’t enough time for a win,” the batting stars came up with an atrocious script to simply giftwrap the game and hand it over to South Africa. Well in time for the New Year’s party.

Yes, this is just a game, only one team can win. Yes, the series is “evenly poised,” there’s one Test to go. And oh yes, this not the first time that India have slipped up immediately after taking a 1-0 lead in a Test series — Zimbabwe 2001, West Indies 2002, Australia 2003, Pakistan 2004, Pakistan (in India) 2005, England (in India) 2006.

But what was extremely “disappointing” here was the way they vanished into the dark with just one brief flicker of a 66-ball, 59-run fight from Mahendra Dhoni (47) and Zaheer Khan (21). Now the shame sequence: 39/2 overnight, 47/4 in the delayed first 20-minute capsule of play, 85/6 in the first hour of the next.

Wasim Jaffer tried to pull a ball from Ntini from wide outside the off-stump — he wouldn’t have done that even in a Mumbai league game. Sachin Tendulkar, beaten by pace, played down the wrong line, again to Ntini — he wouldn’t want to watch that lbw replay. VVS Laxman played the wrong stroke, going across the line to a fast in-cutter — he wouldn’t reach for the rewind button, either.

And Sourav Ganguly. ‘Proud to be Indian,’ said the slogan on the back of his T-shirt last night as he stepped out of the hotel with little Sana. Maybe, the way Dada showed his back today was the story of India’s surrender.

Landing here under a cloud of controversy, displaying exceptional resolve in his first tour game and then in the first Test, Ganguly today came face to face with the big moment, the real one. Would he stand up like he has done over the last month, would he show the South Africans that this Indian batting line-up does have some steel, would he come with that one comeback-defining knock?

The answer, sadly, was a big no. In fact, he virtually lived on the edge, flinging his bat, reaching for balls that were never there. Not one of those four boundaries in his 26 was authentic, three of them were downright embarrassing — a topedged pull over slips, a wishful jab that took the inside edge, another outside touch past gully. His dismissal? Another fancy cut to an Ntini delivery angling away from him, straight to Gibbs at gully.

What was left? Just the stinking debris — and Dhoni, another knock on his bruised finger and a brief statement of courage punctuated with 10 boundaries. “He batted really well. He has been learning, adapting and working hard to curb his natural instincts,” said Dravid.

In the end, Sreesanth’s theatrics were perhaps the perfect punchline for this cruel Indian joke. “There was a bit of acting going on there,” frowned Smith. “First he said he couldn’t see the ball, then he drove a half volley two balls later for four. I asked him can you see the ball now?” laughed Ntini, back with a bang with five crucial wickets after the flopshow in Johannesburg.

Dravid, however, didn’t find it funny, he is already focusing on the third Test starting on January 2. His areas of concern? Obviously, the top order, and how to manage their resources after the huge workload his three seamers and Kumble have put in over the last two weeks. “The good thing is there are only two days to go. So there’s no time to brood over this one,” he said.

Maybe, he should listen to Smith on what turned the series on for South Africa. “We were honest with ourselves and that helped us turn it around. We knew we had played badly then, and we had a few serious chats in the dressing room about it. That worked.”