There was a somewhat sombre note to the proceedings at India's press conference this morning. With 24 hours to go to the third and final Test, both Sourav Ganguly and John Wright have weighty matters on their minds and as a member of the media's foreign legion told me, "Ganguly seems to be everywhere but here".

Although the team gave a spluttering performance at Ahmedabad, the captain's predicament is almost entirely down to his personal form, or rather the lack of it. Those boundaries off Andy Flintoff at the fag-end of the second Test - with nothing at stake but boring old statistics - fooled no one. Till Ganguly can walk through the storm and find the blue sky, as Mark Taylor did after a two-year horror run, the knives of the media will keep carving intricate patterns on his back.

Wright, who has the unstinting support of all his players, will find out in less than a week if his services are deemed surplus to requirements by Jagmohan Dalmiya. Now that Indian cricket's big cheese has his sights trained on Wright, there is a siege mentality about this Indian team that is more in keeping with a team heading for defeat and not one holding a 1-0 lead.

The newly laid pitch at the Chinnaswamy Stadium is an unknown quantity and that explains India's reluctance to take risks. A member of the Karnataka Cricket Association (KCA) told me that it is their aim eventually to have the pitch here resemble an Australian one - fast, true and bouncy. That's certainly not music to Indian ears, not with our record on such tracks. except that it would give the batsmen some practice.

For the moment though, the greenish tinge is mere window-dressing on a hard and flat track that promises to give the batsmen plenty of Christmas presents. Bangalore hasn't been a happy stomping ground for India in recent times and England will take heart from the manner in which Nicky Boje ran through the hosts two seasons ago. Ashley Giles is twice the bowler that Boje is but at the same time, the English batsmen have done nothing to suggest that they've worked out the Indian spinners the way South Africa did.

For India, the core group of players has to deliver. Runs have to be made with more consistency and wickets thrown away with less enthusiasm. And as Javagal Srinath, who had a miserable time in Ahmedabad, will tell you, it helps when you hold your catches.

For all the talk of crisis, India are likely to make only the one change, if any. Sarandeep Singh will come in for Tinu Yohannan if the think-tank decides that a spinning trident will unlock England. Deep Dasgupta has had a shocking time of it behind the stumps but his resilient batting at the top of the order allows him to fight another day.

If local hero Anil Kumble can pick up wicket No. 300 and engineer another home triumph, the crisis will blow over - momentarily. You only need to take one look at Ganguly and Wright to understand the importance of this match. A drawn series against England would be seen as a massive step back and heads will roll. It's easy to imagine India playing this game with Dalmiya's raised scimitar casting an ugly shadow over them.

India (probable)1 Shiv Sunder Das, 2 Deep Dasgupta (wk), 3 Rahul Dravid, 4 Sachin Tendulkar, 5 Sourav Ganguly (capt), 6 VVS Laxman, 7 Virender Sehwag, 8 Anil Kumble, 9 Javagal Srinath, 10 Harbhajan Singh, 11 Sarandeep Singh.

Dileep Premachandran is assistant editor of Wisden.com India. Look out for full coverage of the third Test from 9.30am Indian time (4am GMT) on Wednesday, with bulletins from S Rajesh and Lawrence Booth, verdicts from Dileep Premachandran and roving reports from Tanya Aldred.

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