A battle of attrition: Four things we learnt from India's first practice match in the West Indies

India’s Caribbean sojourn has well and truly started. Virat Kohli and his team finished a practice match against the West Indies Cricket Board President’s XI on Sunday. While it would be foolhardy to jump to too many conclusions from a match which was little more than glorified net practice, it still threw up a few things to watch out for as India attempt a third consecutive Test series win in the West Indies.

Slow pitches

Surfaces in West Indies are no longer the fast decks they were in the 1970s and ‘80s, when their fearsome West Indian pacers used to reign. They’ve been becoming slower and slower over the years, and if the practice match is any indication, even this series is likely to go the same way.

India scored 258 runs in their 93 overs, at a run rate of below three. The highest strike rate among the batsmen was Shikhar Dhawa's with 56 when he retired after scoring 51 off 109 balls. The WICB XI scored a trifle faster at a run rate of over three and even Amit Mishra hinted at the slowness of the track, saying that bowling on it was “difficult”.

The conclusion: expect the cricket to be attritional. Slow pitches become more a test of patience than anything else, and both bowlers and batsmen will have to work hard.

The Kumble factor

New Indian head coach Anil Kumble knows West Indies well. One of his finest moments on the cricket field came here in Antigua when he walked out nursing a broken jaw, bowled 14 overs on the trot, even taking out a certain Brian Charles Lara. And his record here is quite impressive – 45 wickets in 11 Tests with a best of 6/78.

So, Kumble’s experience of conditions will be very useful for an inexperienced Indian team. Mishra stood out with figures of 4/67 in the match and impressed, breaking a 122-run partnership by deceiving Rajendra Chandrika and having him stumped and then dismissing Jermaine Blackwood off the next ball as well. He later made a point to thank Kumble for his inputs:

“There were many things that he [Kumble] told me, like my bowling technique, landing and finishing. Looking at the wicket, he told me what are the areas where I can bowl, and the kind of fields that I could set on a slow wicket.”

On slow pitches where the turn on offer could be minimal, Kumble, who was a master at prising wickets out in such conditions, will be a pillar of strength for Mishra and Ravichandran Ashwin.

What about the Indian batsmen?

Again, it would be wrong to jump to any quick conclusions based on this match. Three Indian batsmen, KL Rahul, Shikhar Dhawan and Rohit Sharma, scored half-centuries while Cheteshwar Pujara scored 34. Those are good tidings, but Virat Kohli and Ajinkya Rahane will want to do better, both having fallen for low scores.

In fact, Kohli will definitely not be happy because this tour marks an opportunity for him to rack up the numbers in the West Indies, where he averages a paltry 15.20 in three matches. And though he might be in superhuman form in the limited-overs arena, there’s one small aspect which has gone a little overlooked: since his brilliant performance in the Sydney Test in Australia in January 2015, Kohli has gone a little off the boil with the red ball. In 13 innings since then, he only has two half centuries and a century. Surely, with the kind of form he is in, that’s going to change very soon.

Pacers need to buck up

Ashwin wasn’t played in the practice match, with India deciding to test their three seamers, and the returns weren’t good. Bhuvneshwar Kumar picked up a wicket and was economical (1/29 in 13 overs), but he was the exception.

Mohammad Shami, coming in after a long injury layoff, also picked up a wicket but he gave away a bit (1/62 in 17), while Ishant Sharma went wicket-less. Umesh Yadav’s economy rate was close to four, despite his solitary wicket, and on the slow surfaces that India are likely to play on, the seamers will need to tighten the screws.