In an unforeseen twist to the see-saw one-day series between India and West Indies, Michael Holding, the great West Indian fast bowler of the past, has questioned the veracity of the toss for the sixth one-dayer at Jodhpur, which India won to level the series. In his post-match column in the Hindustan Times, Holding, who is member of the television-commentary team said: "Though the newspapers will record that India won the toss and, as predicted, elected to bat second, could someone please let us know who really won the toss?"

Holding's fellow commentator Ian Bishop, who was present at the toss, appeared to believe that Carl Hooper had won for West Indies but the momentary confusion was cleared when Hooper made way for stand-in Indian captain Rahul Dravid to announce his decision to bowl first.

Holding also criticised the manner in which West Indies succumbed towards the end of their innings. "It was imperative that the lower order, led by Ridley Jacobs, concentrated on occupying the crease for 50 overs," he wrote. "That could not have been uppermost in their minds, as Jacobs certainly would not have taken a single at the beginning of an over to expose [tailender] Pedro Collins for the next five deliveries.

"Those three-and-a-half overs the West Indies missed out on could have given them another 15-20 runs that could have made a big difference," he continued. "But then again, a win for West Indies would have meant a 'dead' seventh one-dayer at Vijayawada."

Punters are already saying that they knew before the series began what course the games would take. Rajat Vaid, a businessman from Delhi, said: "The market was certain, even before the first one-dayer, it would be 3-3 after six matches. I don't know how they knew, but they knew."

Interestingly, the two one-day series that India had played at home before this, against England and Zimbabwe, had also gone down to the wire. India drew with England 3-3 and beat Zimbabwe 3-2 after the two teams were level with two wins apiece. Scyld Berry, a cricket columnist for the Sunday Telegraph, had cast doubts on the results of the India-Zimbabwe series, suggesting that ICC should investigate further.

Meanwhile, a group of four Indian bookies were arrested in Kathmandu by the Nepal police for allegedly running a betting racket. They were organising bets on the game in question for a sum of money reported to be up to one million rupees. Clearly they were small fry – the money involved in betting on cricket in India is estimated by some to be a few hundred times that much.

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