Old habits die hard

Writing in his blog at Espnstar.com, R Mohan explores the attitude of Indian skippers to home Tests.

'Pacha' kept the pitch very dry, which means he simply did not prepare the pitch as he normally would have. He may have been seized by the fear that if he prepared the wicket with regular watering it would be the typically hard Chepauk pitch at the start of play.

There is more than a suggestion in all this that Team India would have been happy to avoid a showdown with Dale Steyn, the South African quick who is making waves with his swing to the extent of becoming the man of the series in three successive series for South Africa. Any moisture in the pitch would have aided lateral movement of the new ball and India simply wished to avoid this.