THE WORLD CUP hasn’t sunk very deep in India still. But it won’t be the same tomorrow (March 17) onwards, when Indian tryst for the Cup begins with its encounter with a relative minnow, Bangladesh, at the Queen’s Park Oval on Saturday.

 

As Indian fans get ready, putting everything aside and reserving late evenings only for cricket, the Indian team in the Caribbean islands are getting mentally prepared to coast through the Cup and take the setbacks and successes that would come their way.

 

At the foothill of the mountain before them is the oddball Bangladesh, which no long are regarded a pushover — not especially after its surprise showing against New Zealand in the pre-World Cup warm-up matches.

 

Indians have the Kiwi experience to remind them of the tough task ahead of them in the opening encounter. The Indian team management sure must be strategizing on the basis of New Zealand captain Stephen Fleming’s confession that the Bangladeshis had given his team “a great, big headache” at Bridgetown warm-up game. That the Kiwis managed to scrape through with a two-wicket win against the relative new World Cup entrant, will be not be lost on the Indian players as they await taking on Habibul Bashar’s team in the opening fixture with nervous anticipation.

 

It is this recent performance of Bangladesh that has sent alarm bells ringing among the top-rated Group B teams, including Sri Lanka besides India. Though going by the record books, the Indian team holds a clear edge with 13 recorded one-day victories in 14 encounters so far, the Bangaldesh cricketers have in them to upstage any team of reckoning on their day. Rahul Dravid’s team would sure be counting on their performance and prayers to get past the underdog rival in the opening clash. Dravid knows the team cannot take it easy and has asked his teammates to remain “switched on” for the match against Bangladesh.

 

Bangladesh has only won once against India. That was in Dhaka in 2004. Three years later, and that too in the World Cup, the Indian team would hate to see the repeat of history at the Queens Park. To ensure this doesn’t happen, they would depend on their top-order batsmen like Rahul Dravid, Saurav Ganguly, Sachin Tendulakar, Virender Shewag and Yvraj Singh to deliver. If any two of them score big runs and all contribute to amass a big Indian total, the Indian team can hope to get off to a flying start at the World Cup. The Indian batsmen would, however, have to be wary of Bangladeshi fast bowler  Mashrafe Mortaza and spinners Mohammad Rafiue and Abdur Razzak, who have demonstrated their form and lethality in the practice matches.

 

Well begun is half done. Let’s see how Team India fares in the opening lesser encounter tomorrow, which will set the contours of its success in the World Cup.