Are India pinning too much hope on Viru, Zaheer?

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In a week marked by defeat and dismay the good news up front: Virender Sehwag and Zaheer Khan, touted as India’s big hopes in preventing a total rout in this series, are in action and look intent on regaining their Test places.
Sehwag, unaffected by jet lag, spent the better part of an hour at the indoor nets at Northants County ground and did not wince even once.

The recently repaired shoulder seems to have recovered mobility and strength. He didn’t unleash his trademark ‘upper-cut’ nor launched often into those expansive cover drives which is a bowler’s nightmare. But he middled the ball well and even managed a smile every now and then, which should alleviate some despondency in the Indian camp.
Zaheer bowled six or seven overs — most of them at medium-pace throttle — on Wednesday evening, followed up with more intensive strength-building workouts and bowls on Thursday.
Though his run-up was a understandably little ginger, the much-discussed hamstring held up to the rigours well enough to convince the team management that he is fit to play the two-day game here, and then hopefully the Test at Birmingham.
So far so good, but the more pertinent query is whether too much hope is not being pinned on these players who are coming back straight from fairly serious injury, and without adequate time spent in the middle.
That match practice is a different ball game from net practice is a cricketing truism.
Ironically — or perhaps not quite so given the ill-construed itinerary for this tour — the lead-up match to the third Test is of only two days which means that both these players may not get much time in the middle. With the weather in Northants expected to be inclement, this time may be even more restricted. It is not that Indian players drafted into a big game without enough practice have never done well in the past. In 1967, when M.L. Jaisimha flew in to Australia in place of the injured Chandrashekhar, he scored 74 and 101 in the third Test within a couple of days of his arrival.
Where bowlers are concerned, Madan Lal was drafted in from league cricket here and became one of the big influences in India’s victory in 1986. The biggest success of them all was perhaps Vinoo Mankad in 1952. After India were trounced in the first Test at Leeds, the all-rounder was released by his club here and made 72 and 184 and took 5/196 at Lord’s which is now better known as Mankad’s Test.
While it may be true that players who get a sudden call will be motivated more to prove a point, this is no substitute for practice and acclimitisation.
In all the three instances given above, the players concerned had been actively playing some cricket at the time of being called up for national duty. If nothing else, Sehwag and Zaheer will surely have to work against the law of probability.
In this context, it is also a moot point whether the replacement for injured Harbhajan Singh could not have been left-arm spinner Murali Kartik currently playing for Middlesex. Without any discredit to young Pragyan Ojha, Kartik’s experience of English conditions would have been of immediate value. He needs no acclimatisation, and he has also bowled to all the English batsmen in the current team.
The impressive R. Ashwin also seemed a more credible option since it would have been a simple trade-off between off between off-spinners. India now have two slow bowlers whose stock delivery turns the same way in Amit Mishra and Ojha.
But these are all speculative iffs and buts. Ojha could surprise everybody if he is played.
What is not idle speculation, however, is that India need to raise their level of energy and motivation to even compete against this rampaging England team. They are on the verge of a whitewash unless they show some spine.