RP Singh started nervously as expected but then settled down to bowl a fine opening spell. There was some movement off the pitch too, and the delivery that clipped the inside edge of Salman Butt's bat cut back in beautifully to force the mistake. He didn't overdo the short stuff as he often tends to, and troubled most of the batsmen from just short of a good length. Zaheer bowled with real verve, even if not at top pace. The fact that the two turned out to be India's best bowlers on the day vindicated the management's brave decision, even if the scoreboard suggested that India had taken a real beating. Zaheer Khan and RP Singh were both massive gambles, one an established international prone to inconsistency, and the other a hugely promising 20-year-old with just eight one-day internationals to press his case. Given the similar nature of the Faisalabad pitch and the depth of batting talent at Pakistan's disposal, it was imperative that the Indians maintained greater control, especially in the event of losing the toss. The batting heroics of Virender Sehwag and Rahul Dravid had helped gloss over the paucity of India's bowling resources at Lahore. But when the man forced to watch the action from the dressing-room balcony happened to be Sourav Ganguly, you can be sure that the decision was not a straightforward one, even if it made plenty of sense when viewed logically. But for the identity of the man caught in the vortex, there would have been nothing remotely controversial about India's gambit to go into this Test with five specialist bowlers.
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