The Coca-Cola Cup tri-series took off on a wrong note for India as they lost their opening matches to New Zealand and Sri Lanka. I had mentioned in my last column that India had a chance if they could handle Muralitharan. I am afraid the way the batsmen fared against a limited New Zealand attack in the pipe opener made one wonder what is wrong with them.

Ganguly and Dravid, the two senior players, have to take the blame for the 84-run drubbing. Our batting revolves around both of them; the rest of the batsmen are not yet established enough to pose even a psychological advantage. The way Dravid got out gave me the impression that he struggles to get runs if the bowling is tidy in length and directed on the off stump or thereabouts. He has to develop the art of playing with soft hands to rotate the strike.

As far as Ganguly is concerned, he has to take the bowling by the scruff of the neck and open up like Jayasuriya. Fortune favours the adventurous. He has shown a weakness around the rib cage and also fishes around outside the off stump. Ganguly is a classy batsman, no doubt, and I hope he does not encourage the opinion that is forming among followers of the game that both he and Dravid can only play well if Tendulkar is around to tame the attack and take the pressure off them.

The bowling now revolves around Harbhajan who choked the runs on a soft turner but his mettle will be tested on wickets which are not as responsive. It was nice to see the two left armers Ashish Nehra and Zaheer Khan bowling in tandem but they have still to develop the art of bowling with the old ball. The Indian think-tank had a lot of homework to do after the humiliating defeat and one of the solutions they arrived at was to shuffle the batting order for the next game against Sri Lanka.

Despite all the tinkering, this batting line-up remains highly fragile. The Khurasiya-Yuvraj pairing never seemed like providing a good start from where Ganguly and Dravid could pick up the threads. Ganguly looks comfortable down the order but I believe a question mark still hangs over his technique to counter class spinners. Dravid spends too much time in the middle for too little returns and does not possess the ability to keep the board ticking and raise the tempo at the crunch. On the contrary, Laxman is one batsman who likes to play his shots with abandon, irrespective of the situation and I feel that he should be opening the innings.

Both New Zealand and Sri Lanka are confident if they merely put up 200 plus scores against India. Since the batsmen can't chase even modest targets, the onus is on our bowlers to skittle out their opponents for less than 150 to feel confident of winning. But the bowling has shown a lack of depth and imagination to keep the rate of scoring down. The only bowler who looks like getting respect is Harbhajan. Frequent bowling of his faster deliveries however may result in Harbhajan losing his main bowling forte, the off break.

The strategy of New Zealand and Sri Lanka is quite obvious: to play Harbhajan and get around 30 plus runs off him. If he concedes more, it is a bonus but if they play him out without losing too many wickets, they are in business. The rest of the bowlers are not that consistent either in line or length. If the think tank does not take damage control measures quickly, prospects do not bode well for the Indian side. Unless the rub of the green turns in their favour, India will struggle to qualify for the final.

© CricInfo