IN A country full of scenic cricket grounds, none more so than Mount Maunganui’s Bay Oval, Eden Park serves as the classic coming together of the modern and the traditional. The ground isn’t quite the perfect oval; if anything, it more resembles a baseball diamond with irregularly funny boundary dimensions in different parts, and those who aren’t familiar with the lay of the land are guaranteed to have a tough time getting used to the varying sizes. The ground plays host to two of New Zealand’s more popular team sports – rugby union, arguably the most followed discipline with the All Blacks in the forefront, and cricket, where the exploits of the Black Caps hasn’t been too shabby. It’s here, at the same venue where New Zealand played their third ever Test against England in February 1930, that India will seek to correct a dismal record in the first of five One-Day Internationals, on Wednesday. India have lost six and won just three of the ten 50-over internationals between the teams at Eden Park since 1976, with a memorable tie in January 2014 thrown into the mix when R Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja nearly salvaged a lost cause with an entertaining stand of 85 for the seventh wicket in just 61 deliveries. India must go back more than 23 years for the last of their three wins, fashioned by the scything willow of Virender Sehwag, just ahead of the 2003 World Cup. In a low-scoring summer of Tests and ODIs, Sehwag’s unbeaten 112, nearly five times more than the next highest Indian score (23 by Sourav Ganguly), helped the visitors scramble to a one-wicket victory as a chase of 199 almost went pear-shaped.

 

Now, the onus is on Shubman Gill to arrest the string of three losses in the last four outings as he embarks on a second challenging overseas assignment in the last 17 months. Last summer in England marked Gill’s Test captaincy debut – India didn’t play any white-ball games on that tour – and he stood up to the task manfully, with 754 runs from five Tests to galvanise his side to a 2-2 stalemate. The righthander must now reprise those heroics both in the five-match ODI series (he, like several other Test regulars, will miss the last two outings to prepare for the red-ball skirmishes) and the twoTest showdown that follows immediately thereafter. Gill has shown himself already, in his brief stints at the helm of the ODI and Test squads, that he is a worthy successor to Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma, India’s two immediate all-format skippers. Now only one-format internationals, they form a redoubtable ODI core group alongside their dynamic young captain, a core group that, it is expected, will give the Kiwis a terrific run for their money. India are coming off a nervejangling 2-1 victory over West Indies in a tall-scoring series at home, and will look at the lack of bowling experience and depth in the fast bowling department with a bit of concern. With Prasidh Krishna a late withdrawal owing to injury, Mohammed Siraj looms as the lone seasoned hand, though the Hyderabadi hasn’t been a preferred first-choice quick in recent times. Siraj has Anshul Kamboj, Gurnoor Brar, Arshdeep Singh and Auqib Nabi, Prasidh’s replacement, for company. It is unlikely that New Zealand, who have had to rejig their batting with Mark Chapman and Rachin Ravindra both unavailable for selection, will lose too much sleep over thispace unit, though they will beaware of the pitfalls of takinganything lightly. Unquestionably though, thefocus will be on Rohit and Kohli,and how effectively they bringout the heavy weaponry. The nexttwo weeks should be fun.