Starting Super Six with a loss is a major blow from which the team needs a miracle to recover. Of course, mathematically they can still make the semi-finals if they win the next two matches and squeeze out a better equation than two other teams in fray.

But is this Mohammed Azharuddin-led team capable of doing so ?They might have a whole bunch of good players, but in crunch situations, they slip into collective failure. The additional liability is the skipper himself, both in form and as captain.

On Friday, Azharuddin's skewed thinking was to the fore yet again. He was well aware that the pitch was shorn of grass and totally brown. It might have had a little morebounce than he prefers for batting. But to gift away advantage against better advice was a blunder for which the team had to pay.

Track Record

: India won all three matches in this tournament batting first. They lost to South Africa in the opener despite batting first, but that was simply because of the superb hitting of Lance Klusener. The fact that the team made a mess of the easy chase against Zimbabwe should have made the captain wary of chasing.

No Indian team has ever chased well. They might have pulled off the odd victory batting second, but, generally, India cannot handle the pressure of chasing.

The recent performance against Pakistan in the Test series at home when India succumbed at Chennai and Calcutta should have fore-warned Azharuddin. He probably depended on the genius of Sachin Tendulkar to overcome the problems, much in the fashion the maestro did in Sharjah.

Tendulkar, after the lay-off from international cricket, is not the same batsman, the innings against Kenyanotwithstanding. And in any case, Glenn McGrath is not the sort of bowler who can be toyed with. He is one of the best and his continued success against Brian Lara and Tendulkar proves it.

Perhaps, it would have been far more prudent to send Nayan Mongia up the order. After all, he is the sort of batsman who struggles to get going in the slog overs.

And in this World Cup, where the need is to keep wickets intact in the first 15 overs, Mongia's elevation would actually have been a positive move. He might well have seen off McGrath (sometimes for a batsman to get a touch to super deliveries, he needs to be in great nick or a very good player. With luck, an average batsman would only get beaten) whose sensational burst accounted for two of the best batsmen in the team, and Azharuddin.

Whatever the batting order though, India gave away too many runs. May be, they could have handled 250. But 282 was 30 runs too many, even if the top three batsmen came good.

Now, with yet another defeat, bells surely tollfor Azharuddin. But is it loud enough for the board and the selectors to hear ?