PHOTO: S. SUBRAMANIUM

ELEGANT KNOCK: Wasim Jaffer played responsibly to not only etch a classy maiden Test hundred but also ensure that India came out unscathed from the first Test.

Nagpur: A match that was chugging to a draw crackled to life as if on a whim.

Mudhsuden Panesar turned one from the foot-holes across Rahul Dravid's correct bat after nearly four and a half hours of the finest defensive batting. What followed was a blur, a time-warp.

India further needed another 200 in 24.3 overs, and instead of Sachin Tendulkar out jogged Irfan Pathan! Dravid, after tea, had shown signs of accelerating. In 12.5 frenzied overs after his dismissal, Pathan, Dhoni and Tendulkar plundered 92 as four wickets fell before the match was called off.

The result was never in doubt, after Wasim Jaffer (100, 198b, 12x4), in his skipper's steadying presence, ensured India would not go to Mohali one down.

When Virender Sehwag had trooped off, a disconsolate look at the wreckage behind and a suspicious one at the track, the stench of ignominy hung heavy in the tense Sunday air.

England, after dithering the previous day, had declared on its overnight score, leaving India 368 to make and — more realistically — three sessions to bat out.

The Delhi opener had flashed at the first ball he faced: short, wide and pacy, Harmison had drawn the curve through off. Little resulted, but Sehwag's intentions were clear. Sharp fielding and a tight line had him pinned for 12 balls without a run. Something had to snap.

Could have been costly

It did. Hoggard nipped one back off a wobbly seam, Sehwag threw his arms at the original line of the delivery without propping forward enough, and middle and off parted grotesquely. One for one. The stroke was wanton because if a collapse had ensued, the fallout would have been nasty.

But, calamity to Dravid is a time for the un-twitching brow and the iron will. That he averages 47.17 batting fourth is testament to his skill as a batsman, and reputation as one of the greatest of this era.

Few men walking in at one drop have such a calming effect on the system, and he was in his element straight away: clear eye, steady head, high elbow, all locked in. Seventy-one in 187 balls resulted. More crucial than the runs, was the time (268m) for which he thwarted England

But even the maestro of technique had to give way to Jaffer, who last played a Test three and a half years ago. The lithe opener had been in seductive touch during his 81 first time around.

With the pitch deteriorating, as pitches do on the fifth day, and England's bowlers steaming in, survival demanded the concentration and mental equanimity normally found in Trappist monasteries. And no little skill.

To bat over five hours, compile your maiden hundred, and take your team to safety is regular boy-on-the burning-bridge stuff. To do that with elan and class as Jaffer did this day is special.

For the 28-year-old constructed strokes of fine beauty and intricate detail of blown glass. "The ideas of its maker, of the techniques, practices, and styles at the very moment of its making," as Chloe Zerwick wrote are revealed in each specimen of the fragile artefact.

Tightness of technique

Much the same can be said of each of Jaffer's strokes. For him, to see the ball on off-stump and persuade it to square-leg is the matter of twinkling the wrists. These he played all day bisecting the leg-side as if on impulse.

Even more impressive was the tightness of his technique. Criticism of Jaffer's early years was a tendency to stiffen his front knee, and hence drive away from his body. He has evidently worked on this — his defensive strokes off either foot were airtight, and not once was he beaten when attempting to stop a ball dead.

With lunch in sight, wicketkeeper Geraint Jones put Dravid down. Left-arm spinner Ian Blackwell, from over the wicket, had tempted the Indian skipper to drive and had turned it enough to get a feather. Jones had dropped Kumble in the first innings; when Dravid's nick sounded in and out, the chances of England winning grew remote.

Jaffer himself was let off twice, on 61 and 70: first when England cottoned on, packed the offside, bowled wide after lunch to have him drive uppishly to the tactically placed short-cover; the second when substitute Matt Prior failed to under-arm the one stump he could see after Jaffer had set off mistakenly from the non-striker's end.

Either would have been a cruel fate, a fate unbecoming of what had gone on before.

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