As the Indian team gets ready to pack its bags for the Zimbabwean tour, the subject which has been discussed threadbare by the press and public is our poor overseas record in the last 15 years. The basic problem plaguing us through the last decade and more has been our inadequate bowling strength, the inability to produce a genuine all surface matchwinner.

If you look at the composition of the side in the late 60s and 70s. we had several useful allrounders, so immensely vital to the overall balance of the team, in Borde, Surti, Nadkarni, Abid, Durrani and Solkar, whose quicksilver reflexes were also an asset. More pertinently, the quality of our bowling meant that we were always in a position to register wins abroad. Even a small score to defend looked sufficient.

Never mind that our seam attack was virtually non- existent; we had three spinners who could rotate and keep the pressure on all the time. The bowling, whether seam or spin, has to be capable of relentlessly applying the screws, thus offering the batsmen the psychological whiphand. In all our victories abroad in the seventies, only once did the batsmen have to chase a sizable target of 400 plus at Port of Spain. In the other games, the bowlers had whittled the target down within reach.

The squad chosen seems to be well stocked with seam bowlers but what worries me is the spin department. Zimbabwe have several lefthanders in their line-up including their two main batsmen Andy Flower and Alistair Campbell, so I'd have presumed the choice of two off spinners was mandatory but the selectors had other ideas. When New Zealand toured Zimbabwe last September, I noticed that the wickets were responsive to spin. It is a shade premature to presume that we're going to have green tops on offer. Indeed I believe the Zimbabweans would be very happy to draw the series and by preparing placid tracks, could render the Indian seam attack superfluous.

Another factor in our long victory drought could be that the Indian players have not believed in themselves often enough in the past. I don't think that sort of negative mental framework exists in the present team. They seem to be a determined lot but that could be because they are playing one of the minnows in Zimbabwe. Indian skipper Saurav Ganguly said in one of his press conferences that we should watch out for the West Indies in the triangular one-day series which is also a subtle way of saying that he doesn't perceive any threat from Zimbabwe.

I'm quite confident that we will come back victorious but the outcome depends on Zimbabwe's approach. A drawn series will, of course, mean that our barren run continues. Since Zimbabwe already have a winning record against India at home, the onus is squarely on the visitors to turn that around. But the real test for India lies in the months ahead when we travel to Sri Lanka and especially South Africa. The results there will be a more accurate index of whether India has finally exorcised the overseas jinx.

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