India at 356 for two has taken a stranglehold on this Test match and unless Pakistan can pull some rabbit out of the hat, one fears may have been batted out for there is a huge amount of batting to come and at the same time Virender Sehwag is still there as is Sachin Tendulkar.
It does not happen often that everything goes right for one team and everything goes wrong for the other. This was such a day. And the question foremost in my mind is who is responsible for preparing such a wicket?
Do we need to import a curator to take us back in time to the wickets that we used to have at Faisalabad? Dennis Lillee had vowed never to tour Pakistan and Bishen Bedi had wanted to be buried in it since it was a bowler's graveyard.
Pakistan's fast bowlers must have taken one look at it and abandoned hope. All the more strange that the wise men who pick the playing eleven should have got the team hopelessly wrong. What was the point of playing Shabbir Ahmed and leaving out Danish Kaneria?
India has Anil Kumble and he may not mind bowling on this track particularly if his team has a score in the vicinity of 600 plus as it seems likely.
Nothing should be taken away from Sehwag's 228 made off only 271 balls. It was a blistering innings but Pakistan should have got him when he was 68 and he dropped by Sami off Saqlain Mushtaq. This dropped catch may prove far more expensive than just in terms of runs in this match.
It could influence the series for Sehwag is already looking seven feet tall. He could get taller for Pakistan's bowlers will hold no fears for him from now on. Tendulkar was relatively quiet through the mayhem of Sehwag's plunder but he was clearly biding his time, batting as if he had planned his innings when he was still in Mumbai.
Beware, the fury of a patient man goes an old saying. Pakistan somehow must get him out early or there is another leather in store of the kind that will be soul-destroying. We knew that this was a formidable Indian batting line-up. We did not know that it would be gifted a batting track that would make it seem invincible.
One can only hope that Pakistan's batsmen can bat equally brilliantly and run up a matching total. But a mountain of runs creates its own pressure. Someone besides Inzamam will have to make big runs.
Inzamam, of course, has the opportunity to show his great form to his home crowd, sparse as it was on the first day. The fate of this Test match, and Pakistan will happily settle for a draw at this juncture, rest with the batsmen.
Quite a turnaround for we believed that it was our bowling that was our strength. But the bowlers needed a wicket somewhat less flat. They did try hard and for this they must be praised. And surely they can't lose hope but someone needs to reassure them that on such a wicket even the West Indian fast bowlers of yesteryear would have got the same pasting.
