Tendulkar Edged Out of Lead Role in Test Rehearsal

This was a dress rehearsal for India and they did not waste any scintillating performances here. Their star, Sachin Tendulkar, made a fleeting and forgettable 10 minute appearance and the rest muddled along as if preoccupied with greater challenges ahead.

India played their likely Test batsmen plus their two frontline spinners, but their primary pacemen, Zaheer Khan and Ashish Nehra, were rested. Upon winning the toss the tourists were faced with a pace attack that is inferior even to England's injury struck line-up. But they were also batting on an inferior surface to the one that they will encounter at Lord's. The only misgiving about international cricket coming to the Rose Bowl is that the pitch is still unreliable. Yesterday the bounce was never trustworthy. Hence they could only post a modest total.

In Test cricket India, possessors of some of the most exotic stroke-players in the world, have had a problem in finding a satisfactory opening pair. It looks as if they intend to solve the problem in the most cavalier manner possible. Virender Sehwag opened the batting with Wasim Jaffer and it is assumed that Sehwag will continue in this role on Thursday. Make sure you get there on time.

Sehwag settled into the role happily enough; maybe he was taking his responsibilities too seriously. He certainly won't have enjoyed the manner of his dismissal, blocking an off-spinner, the second propelled in the day by Shaun Udal, and then watched as the ball trickled from the middle of his bat on to the stumps. He was being too discreet, an unusual failing for him.

Udal was the pick of the Hampshire bowlers, which was an oddity. Indian batsmen are rarely discomfited by off-spinners and uneven pitches usually favour quicker bowlers. But Udal despite a modest start to this season showed that the ball does not have to be turning at right angles to trouble batsmen. He was accurate; he varied his pace cleverly and exploited the unevenness of the pitch better than any of his colleagues - you don't have to bowl in excess of 80 mph to prosper.

At the outset James Tomlinson, a student at Cardiff, did his best to exceed 80 mph with his skidding left-armers and did enough to find the edge of Jaffer's bat. Sehwag and Rahul Dravid righted the innings for a while until the first of Udal's unlikely interventions. For having bagged Sehwag, Udal had the temerity to dispose of Tendulkar. The little master attempted a drive on the leg-side. Instead the ball flew from the leading edge to Dmitri Mascharenhas at backward point. Most of a healthy crowd were despondent, but Udal skipped around like a 10-year- old. Sourav Ganguly was troubled by short deliveries - on one occasion a mistimed pull should have been caught at midwicket - and John Crawley is likely to pass on this information. Ganguly, I suspect, will not be invited to drive too often by England at Lord's. Soon he looked grumpy to be given out caught behind cutting at Udal.

Dravid remained disciplined and conscientious while compiling 78. He hooked the short ball with precision and drove confidently. When England last played Test cricket against India he was out of sorts. Here in England his game looks altogether sharper. He is the form batsman in the Indian side even though he misjudged a nip-backer from Mascarenhas and was bowled without offering a shot. Neither Ajay Ratra nor Sanjay Bangar, another Udal victim, dallied for long so that Hampshire could contemplate repeating their epic performance against the Australians of last year when they won by two wickets. It is certainly a "result" pitch. Crawley may prefer batting at Lord's.