A resurgent India , boosted by two successive wins , will aim to seal the series here on Wednesday when they play the fourth One-Day International against England.
MS Dhoni's team is leading 2-1 in the five-match series after having lost the first match, and would try to finish the competition with a flourish at the Punjab Cricket Association Stadium.
India are currently No.1 in the ICC ODI rankings, but a solitary rating point separates them from England, who have 118. So if India win the series, they would consolidate their position atop the ladder.
MS Dhoni's team is leading 2-1 in the five-match series after having lost the first match, and would try to finish the competition with a flourish at the Punjab Cricket Association Stadium.
India are currently No.1 in the ICC ODI rankings, but a solitary rating point separates them from England, who have 118. So if India win the series, they would consolidate their position atop the ladder.
Suresh Raina practises a lofted stroke in Mohali on Tuesday
Since the match is scheduled to begin at 12 noon, the ground will get roughly five hours of sunshine on Wednesday morning, if the clouds don't block it.
It has been snowing and raining in the hills nearby and that has affected the ground preparation here. Lack of sunshine has affected the growth of grass and the ground is looking perhaps as brown as ever.
"It is much better now. If you had seen the outfield a few days earlier, it was almost black," said a PCA official.
Some of the local officials fear that the Mohali game might turn out to be a low scoring one due to the cold weather as that would give pacers ascendency.
Indian bowlers did a wonderful job by bowling out England for just 155 in 42.2 overs, with leftarmer Ravindra Jadeja taking three scalps, in the third match in Ranchi. Then Virat Kohli rediscovered his touch to lead India's successful chase with a fluent 77 not out.
Yuvraj Singh made 30 in that game, but he did not practice along with the team here on Tuesday. The word from the team management was that he has the flu. But there was no official communication.
Dhoni, on the other hand, was hit on the thumb by a Manpreet Gony delivery during the practice session, but there was no major scare as such. Jammu and Kashmir pacer Parvez Rasool was also specially invited to bowl at the nets.
England, who won the fourmatch Test series 2-1 last month, have a task at hand. Their ODI team, with a few key players having been rested, has not been able to replicate the performance. The pressure would be on Alastair Cook and his men to level the series.
Interestingly, England lost the previous match played in Mohali, in 2011. That was the last match hosted by the PCA Stadium. Jonathan Trott, who has withdrawn from this series, scored 98 in that match.
The one Indian who would remember that game fondly is Ajinkya Rahane, who scored 91 then and helped India chase 298 successfully. The classical batsman would love to do an encore on Wednesday, after struggling in the last four games.
Lean patch didn't frustrate Kohli
Virat Kohli said on Tuesday that it didn't frustrate him when he was not scoring big, which helped him come good in the third ODI against England in Ranchi.
"No one can keep scoring consistently for a period of 16 to18 months. It's always a balance in international cricket. There will be a phase when you don't score in four-five games," Kohli told reporters on the eve of the fourth ODI here.
Virat Kohli said on Tuesday that it didn't frustrate him when he was not scoring big, which helped him come good in the third ODI against England in Ranchi.
"No one can keep scoring consistently for a period of 16 to18 months. It's always a balance in international cricket. There will be a phase when you don't score in four-five games," Kohli told reporters on the eve of the fourth ODI here.
Says it was important for him to stay composed, which led to his Man of the Match-winning knock in Ranchi
Kohli hoped that the batsmen would extend their form to Mohali. "Hopefully, we will try to maintain that and do it consistently.
It is essential that batting unit fires consistently as bowlers have done well in all the three matches and effort will be that batting complements that," he said.
England off-spinner James Tredwell said that his team was ready to fight back and not let despondency set in.
"It can be quite easy in this part of the world that if you get on a bad trot, you can let your heads drop and we can't allow that to creep in. Obviously, we played really well in the first game. We will try to draw on that performance and try and reach those heights as opposed to dwelling on the poor performances of the last two. We have had a couple of days of good practice and we are going into this one pretty confident," he said.
Tredwell agreed that it was must-win game for England. "Obviously, that is in the back of our minds. But I think if you look forward to the result too quickly, then you take your eye off the process," he said. "I guess we are just going into the game trying to execute our skills as best as we can and if we do that and perform like we did in the first game, there is every chance we can turn them over."
Coaching legend hits out at T20s
Helicopter shots and upper cuts over slips, products of the shortest version of cricket, don't appeal to Desh Prem Azad. The renowned coach calls the Twenty20 format a "graveyard for bowlers".
"T20 is a pastime, but fortunately or unfortunately, it has come to stay.
People come to watch it because they are seeking entertainment; the real cricket is Test matches," Azad, who turned 75 on Sunday, told Mail today.
"T20 is the bowlers' graveyard. It is a completely one-sided format, favouring batsmen.
In this format, you will find crorepatis but not Test players." Azad, the first cricket coach to win the Dronacharya award, is now director of the six academies of the Punjab Cricket Association (PCA) located in different cities across the state. He says players tend to conceal injuries these days.
"Generally, players hide injuries. There are two reasons for the injuries: there is too much cricket, and the lack of fitness. There is a tendency among players to spend a lot of time in gymnasiums and that is not right," he said.
"PCA discourages young players from going to gyms. There is no substitute for running, which is the mother of all fitness exercises."
Azad is concerned with a spate of injuries to players, especially bowlers. "Take the example of Zaheer Khan. Today, age is not on his side, but we need him," he said about the 34-year-old left-arm pacer. "If he had spent more time on the ground, running, and not in the gymnasium, the injuries would probably have been less."
PCA gets govt nod for new stadium
The Punjab Cricket Association (PCA) has got the green signal from the state government to construct a new state-of-theart stadium in nearby Mullanpur at a cost of Rs.230 crore, even as the current ground in Mohali enters the 20th year of hosting One-Day Internationals.
PCA secretary MP Pandove said once the new stadium is complete, it would be the best in the country. "We would complete the stadium in three years from the date the project starts. Once complete, it would be the best stadium in the country and it would remain so for the next 20 years," Pandove told Mail Today.
"The stadium would house the PCA Academy, where players not only from the state but also those from south Asia and other Asian Cricket Council members would be trained."
The stadium, which would have a maximum capacity of 40,000 seats, would be built on a 45-acre plot. That is a lot of space compared to the Mohali stadium, which is built on about 16 acres.
"More seating capacity is not required for a stadium for this area of the state, but it will have more spectator facilities than here at the PCA Stadium in Mohali," said Pandove, who is also head of the BCCI Specialist Academies. "We would have three grounds as part of the stadium project. In addition, we would have a club house, and indoor training facilities."
PCA made the proposal under the mega project scheme of the Punjab government. Under the scheme, a project that is worth over `100 crore gets a 10-year exemption on entertainment tax and electricity duty. "Also, under this scheme, if small holdings fall under a project, those areas are cleared and handed over to the proposer. There are a few holdings in the area earmarked for the stadium, but that wouldn't be a problem," he said.
The Punjab Cricket Association (PCA) has got the green signal from the state government to construct a new state-of-theart stadium in nearby Mullanpur at a cost of Rs.230 crore, even as the current ground in Mohali enters the 20th year of hosting One-Day Internationals.
PCA secretary MP Pandove said once the new stadium is complete, it would be the best in the country. "We would complete the stadium in three years from the date the project starts. Once complete, it would be the best stadium in the country and it would remain so for the next 20 years," Pandove told Mail Today.
"The stadium would house the PCA Academy, where players not only from the state but also those from south Asia and other Asian Cricket Council members would be trained."
The stadium, which would have a maximum capacity of 40,000 seats, would be built on a 45-acre plot. That is a lot of space compared to the Mohali stadium, which is built on about 16 acres.
"More seating capacity is not required for a stadium for this area of the state, but it will have more spectator facilities than here at the PCA Stadium in Mohali," said Pandove, who is also head of the BCCI Specialist Academies. "We would have three grounds as part of the stadium project. In addition, we would have a club house, and indoor training facilities."
PCA made the proposal under the mega project scheme of the Punjab government. Under the scheme, a project that is worth over `100 crore gets a 10-year exemption on entertainment tax and electricity duty. "Also, under this scheme, if small holdings fall under a project, those areas are cleared and handed over to the proposer. There are a few holdings in the area earmarked for the stadium, but that wouldn't be a problem," he said.
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