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India's Yuvraj Singh.Photo: Reuters
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THE knives have been out for Yuvraj Singh in India since a photo of him dining with Bollywood actress Deepika Padukone in a Sydney restaurant was published in a national newspaper during the Test series, but the batsman may find the selectors' knives sharpening, too, if he again fails against Australia today.
Yuvraj is perhaps the biggest disappointment of the summer, having arrived in the country almost two months ago in such potent form that the Indian selectors shifted heaven and earth — or at least moved their rock Rahul Dravid to the opening spot — to squeeze him into the middle order for the Test series.
As one of five "icon players" in the Indian Premier League, along with champions Sachin Tendulkar, Dravid, Sourav Ganguly and limited-overs captain Mahendra Dhoni, he will command a huge sum of money (although the reported figure of $440,000 is said to be over the top) to represent his home city of Chandigargh in the extravagant Twenty20 tournament. However, his numbers in Australia, regarded as the true test of an international cricketer, have been rather less flattering.
He played two Tests for scores of 0, 5, 12 and 0 before re-injuring the left knee that had been bothering him since before the series, and has scored 2, 3 and 6 in the triangular series ahead of today's day-nighter at the Adelaide Oval against Australia, which will be his 199th one-day international.
Therein lies part of Yuvraj's great personal frustration, that he has been unable to transfer his obvious gifts — displayed most forcefully when he took young England paceman Stuart Broad for six incredible sixes in an over at last year's Twenty20 world championship — into Test cricket, in which the 26-year-old has played only 22 matches for an average of 32.
But on the eve of the Australian series he looked to have cracked that form of the game much as Andrew Symonds did on Boxing Day 2006, with a superb 169 against arch-rival Pakistan in Bangalore. Unlike Symonds, he did not carry this newfound strength with him.
"Every guy wants to perform over here and sometimes when you are more desperate to perform the pressure mounts on you," said Dhoni.
"The last one, 1½ years he has been the main, middle-order batsman around whom most of the other batsmen have worked.
"A player like him can bounce back in any form of the game, and that's what we are hoping for. He has been in really good form before we came to Australia and it is just a matter of one good knock that gives his confidence back and he again contributes in the team. It's very easy to get Yuvraj back in form."