Date-stamped : 13 Jan97 - 18:18 12 January 1997 Burnout threat queers the pitch for top players Ramaswamy Mohan The Indian cricketers may not be doing too well in South Africa at the moment, but that is not the sufficient reason why we jour- nalists should be charged by an angry African elephant in the Kruger National Park last week. The few seconds of fright may just have brought home to us the kinds of hazards Indian batsmen face when they go out to face the likes of a fired-up Allan Donald and Shaun Pollock. Batting may not quite be a life threatening experience for a top- flight professional cricketer, but after the brush with the tusk- er it is possible to sympathise with the lot of the players. They do believe that far too much international cricket is being played and the sheer volume is a threat both to their careers and the quality they can deliver. The burnout syndrome is becoming obvious, but the game is being driven by the big money that television brings in. The Indians are by far the worst sufferers from this clear over- dose of limited-overs cricket. Consider their programme in 1996 - it began with World Cup, then Singapore, Sharjah. the tour of England, Sri Lanka, Toronto, a single test against Australia and then a triangular at home be- fore playing South Africa in 3 tests and then flying straight here for 3 more. The modern tour is nothing like the more leisurely ones of 1970s and even `80s. The proliferation of limited-overs international series and triangulars has destroyed it forever. Take this tour of South Africa in which the Indians will have played just 2 first class games, but only one before the Test series. The introduction to the bouncy pitches of South Africa after the slow one`s at home was too brief. The South Africans has 2 first class games before swinging into the first Test in India - a number which, irrespective of the series result, is probably fair. Notwithstanding their generally amateurish attitude to tour games, 2 first class matches may have prepared the Indians better. Having said that, there was no way they could have avoid- ed defeat at Kingsmead. Dodging that charging elephant may well have been an easier task. My fear now is whether India have the application and the incli- nation to stave off the term I have coined for it - the "Rainbow Wash". A 3-0 verdict does stare the tourists in the face of the pitch at the Wanderers is going to play somewhere between the seamer`s paradise of Kingsmead and the batsmen`s haven of New- lands. Source :: The Sunday Times Contributed by Bob Dubery (dauphin@aztec.co.za)