The intimidating Indian team

India have fine-tuned the art of intimidation… It’s visible in Zak’s war-cry, in Bhajj’s strut up to the batsman, in Viru’s devil-may-care strokeplay and in Dhoni’s understated bravado

In the on-going series, the Indian pacemen are speaking Glenn McGrath’s language. Zaheer Khan talked of his target man Matthew Hayden, playing the same games that the former Australia bowler had mastered.

“He is a good player. Australia have actually relied quite a lot on Hayden. So to get him out early is our main aim,” Zaheer had said after the first Test in Bangalore, having scalped him in both innings.

Then, he taunted the Aussies bowlers, “We know that they can’t take 20 wickets. They couldn’t get me and Harbhajan out. They are under pressure.”

Australian captain Ricky Ponting dismissed Zaheer claims, but the sweat on his brow after the 320-run defeat in Mohali spoke another story. He would later say of India’s ‘tactics’, “Bit of chit-chat is something okay…They were pretty aggressive the way they were talking, batting and bowling.”

Australians called it intimidation in its raw form, but euphemistically, mind-games or even mental disintegration. Sometimes, it started even before a ball was bowled. Aussies would talk of players on their target-list, infecting the opponents’ heads with the bug of insecurity.

But, now it seems the tables have turned and India has got the Australians’ measure. It’s India now that’s talking ‘Australian’ and we are not discussing the punch line for a beer brand here.

Gone is the soft underbelly of the Indian team, often exposed on long, gruelling tours abroad and sometimes, even at home. They’ve toughened the interior and learnt the art of intimidation. It’s visible in Zaheer’s war-cry every time he picks up a wicket, in Harbhajan Singh’s strut up to the batsman, in Virender Sehwag’s devil-may-care strokeplay, in Sourav Ganguly’s combativeness and in Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s understated bravado.

The chairman of selectors, Krishnamachari Srikkanth, agrees. “This is the new India. We have found aggression and know how to win matches against the toughest opponents. We saw that in the second Test. It was a fantastic performance by the team in Mohali,”

Former India captain Ganguly can be credited to start the transition from the meek and mellow to world beaters that the current side aims to be. In 2001, Ganguly ruffled the most ‘Aussie’ of them all, Steve Waugh, who brought his champions to conquer the last frontier. Waugh wrote in his autobiography, Out of My Comfort Zone, “the continued petulance of Sourav Ganguly in being late for the toss and then walking off by himself after the event had me really wound up…You had to give him ‘A’ for effort in his attempt to annoy us and in particular me. It worked to a certain extent…”India went on to win that most dramatic of series 2-1.

Arun Lal, the former Test batsman and noted commentator, however believes that unless a team plays good cricket mind games count for nothing. “It was the bowlers that made the difference in Bangalore… There are still two games to go and the Australians can come back in the series. If they do, then all this talk of India winning the mind games will count for nothing.”