Sourav Ganguly mixed frankness with diplomacy today, while commenting on his events of the past two weeks and the forthcoming match Test against England. He denied the recent media reports of his outburst against the selectors for the squad they chose for the Mohali Test. "Which journalist did I speak to?" he asked angrily, "I did not say all those things." The only comment he said he had made was to the Hindustan Times, whom he had only told that he had not been consulted by the selectors for this selection; a commonly known fact in any case.

He said he was quite happy with the team that he had been given, but refused to comment on the newcomers. "They looked alright in the nets," he said, "but the match is always different."

Asked whether the Mike Denness affair had brought the team together, he was non-committal, and did not seem to believe that it had any lasting impact on his side. "It happened on the fourth day (of the Port Elizabeth Test), and we batted well on the fifth day to save the match. But we lost quite badly in Centurion."

When asked if the team, supposedly chastised, would now behave itself, he remarked, "But we were on our best behaviour in South Africa." Everybody smiled, believing he was joking, when he added, "I think there should be some aggression in the field. It's a good thing."

India's coach John Wright commented on the long-term weaknesses of the Indian team by pinpointing two key areas of concern. "One," he said, "is our shot selection. We need to be more judicious overseas. And two, is that we're dependent on the quality of our spin bowling, as we saw against Australia. We need to develop more fast bowlers, and for this, there needs to be an emphasis on physical training and strength training."

He agreed with the press that one of India's fundamental weaknesses was the inability to get early breakthroughs, something that will be important at Mohali where the pace bowlers are likely to do all the damage.

© Wisden CricInfo Ltd