Indian work ethic an example to others: Reid

Bowling coach Bruce Reid, who did not give the Indians much of a chance before the Test series against Australia, is now a huge admirer of t...

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Bowling coach Bruce Reid, who did not give the Indians much of a chance before the Test series against Australia, is now a huge admirer of the team and believes other Test nations could learn a lot from them.

Reid initially did not think the Indians would offer much challenge to the Australians but he is now a convert and admires the work ethics of the visitors.

“I was so impressed with their mindset. There is much to learn from the Indians for the other Test nations,” Reid said.

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A former Australian star, Reid joined the Indians before the first Test at the Gabba last month and gives an eye-witness account of what cooked in the team meetings and inside the visitors’ dressing room as they nearly toppled the world champions from their lofty perch.

“They were just not worried about individual reputations. They just played as they saw it. At team meetings they barely mentioned the names of the Australian bowlers.

“They played each ball as they saw it but it was irrelevant who bowled it. I know they rated Jason Gillespie very highly but they felt the more they talked the bowlers up the more of an issue they would become so they hardly spoke of them,” Reid said referring to the success of the Indian batsmen on the tour.

Reid witnessed Indians master Australian bowling and completely neutralised the spin of Stuart MacGill, who averaged 26.31 before the series but had returns of 50.79 for his effort against the Indians.

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Reid found Indians less worked up about their techniques even though some of them possessed the best-organised methods to play pace or spin bowling. “For all their technical mastery, the Indian batsmen backed their instincts and were not overtly obsessed about making technical adjustments to cope with conditions and pitches. They never got technical about things at all. In the nets, you would never hear them talking about their backlift or where their top hand was. They just played.”

The Indians were not concerned about green pitches, said Reid, and they were markedly different from other teams who go into a psychological shell even before they pad up on Australian wickets.

“They just didn’t worry at all whether the wickets were fast or slow or whatever. It was the same with practice wickets,” Reid said.

Reid believes one of the unsung heroes for the visitors in the Test series was Aakash Chopra who nearly always played out the new ball shielding the middle-order batsmen.

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“He never made a 50 in the Tests but you cannot underestimate the role he played in sticking around to protect Rahul Dravid from the new ball.

“It just made a huge difference and it’s been a long time since any openers have done as well in Australia. He is so gutsy.”

Even though the Indians never quite discussed the Australian bowlers, they spent a lot of time in dissecting the home batsmen, planning to trap Justin Langer leg before wicket with in-swingers and bowl full and straight to Adam Gilchrist and at most of the batsmen.

Reid is extremely impressed at how much the team members stuck together during the tour and always seemed intent on helping out each other following guidelines set down by Wright. “In the past, if they were coming out for warm-ups, some of the older guys and the big individual stars might have come 10 minutes after the rest of them. This time they would all come out together.” (PTI)