India's tour of South Africa: What's in store for Dhoni and co. in the African safari?

Bhuvneshwar Kumar

With the team selection discussed, it’s time to turn the attention towards the 22 yards and what awaits us. It’s always a common talking point whenever India tours abroad and this series is going to be no different.

India ‘A’ have done tremendously well in South Africa in the recently concluded unofficial tests and even in the triangular one-day competitions. But the news is that the pitches provided for the series didn’t have lot of chillies and spice added to it which is understandable.

Like any other series, the home team, in this case South Africa, can’t make the mistake of leaving too much of grass on the wicket as it could well turn out to be a suicidal move.

They have got to strike a balance between leaving a decent covering of grass and ensure that the wickets have good bounce to test the Indian batsmen.

Last time around, as always, we started off the tour slowly with a below par display at the Centurion in the first innings with the bat. And also, we were missing Zaheer for the first Test, which meant Jaidev Unadkat was handed the chance to impress on his debut, though he was taken to the cleaners. Although our batting display did improve the second time around, we failed to make South Africa bat again, and lost by an innings.

Coming into the second Test, our bowling was bolstered with the return of Zaheer and on a spicy Kingsmead pitch in Durban, we stunned South Africa by 87 runs. After having done all that hard work and actually having them on the mat at 98-5 in CapeTown in the third Test at one stage, we left them off the hook and Kallis and Boucher came together at the crease and the match ended in a draw with the series finishing at 1-1.

Our first Test series win in South Africa still hasn’t happened and my gut feeling is that this team this year could be ‘the one’ to bring India glory.

If we get off to a decent start and with the kind of strength our team possesses, I wouldn’t rule out a stellar 2-0 series win.