Ganguly hoping for better umpiring in 4th Test

India captain Sourav Ganguly said he is hoping for an improvement in the standard of umpiring in the fourth Test against West Indies, which starts on Friday.

In the third Test in Barbados, West Indies skipper Carl Hooper was adjudged not out by the third umpire when television replays showed him to be clearly short of his ground and even Hooper admitted he was out.

"A few decisions looked very different when you looked at the TV," Ganguly told reporters on Thursday. "We hope such things don't happen again in the series."

Hooper was on 15 when the decision was made but went on to add 215 for the fifth wicket with Shivnarine Chanderpaul as they set up a convincing 10-wicket win to level the series 1-1.

"One can understand mistakes made by the umpires in the centre because they have a fraction of a second to decide, but not when you have fifty television replays for something that was so obvious," Ganguly said.

KUMBLE BACK

India have decided to recall leg-spinner Anil Kumble, their most successful Test bowler with 318 wickets in 69 Tests, in place of off-spinner Harbhajan Singh.

Kumble had been left out of the last two Tests as India went with three pacemen and Harbhajan as the lone spinner, a decision Ganguly described as one of the most difficult he had ever made as captain.

"They are both great spinners, it's hard to choose between them," Ganguly said.

"But Kumble has a lot of experience and took some important wickets on our last tour here in 1997. So, we've decided to go with him."

India had also been contemplating replacing wicketkeeper Ajay Ratra with batsman-wicketkeeper Deep Dasgupta, but decided against it because of Dasgupta's lacklustre form behind the stumps.

Dasgupta, who opened the batting in the first drawn Test at Georgetown, was guilty of dropping three important catches in the match.

But a concern surrounding Ratra has been his poor form with the bat, which has resulted in a lengthening of the Indian tail.

"Ratra deserves one more chance, he's been keeping well," Ganguly said.

West Indies captain, Hooper, is still toying with the idea of going with four pacemen or bringing in leg-spinner Dinanath Ramnarine on a track that is known to offer assistance to slower bowlers.

SLIGHT EDGE

"We may hold a bit of an edge because of our win at Barbados," Hooper said on Thursday.

"But we don't want to be complacent. The Indians are sure to come back into the match strongly," he said.

There are a few other worries for the West Indies going into this match -- poor run-making from both the openers and the tail-enders.

"We are worried about those two departments of our batting, but the boys have worked hard," Hooper said. "Hopefully, they'll set things right here."

The West Indies have replaced opener Stuart Williams with left-hander Wavell Hinds, who has played 20 Tests.

The Antigua Recreation Ground is known for its good batting wicket.

It is the place where Brian Lara got his world record 375 against England eight years ago and Hooper is hoping for a big hundred from the left-hander.

The Barbados win was the first for West Indies in nine matches.

They had come into that match having been beaten in six of their last seven Tests and into the series having lost two straight Test series.

India, who completed their first win in the Caribbean in 26 years at Trinidad last month, beat Sri Lanka in 1993-94 but have not won a Test series outside south Asia in over 16 years.

Teams:

India - Sourav Ganguly (captain), Wasim Jaffer, Shiv Sundar Das, Rahul Dravid, Sachin Tendulkar, Vangipurappu Laxman, Ajay Ratra (wicketkeeper), Anil Kumble, Zaheer Khan, Javagal Srinath, Ashish Nehra

West Indies - Carl Hooper (captain), Chris Gayle, Wavell Hinds, Ramnaresh Sarwan, Brian Lara, Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Ridley Jacobs (wicketkeeper), Mervyn Dillon, Adam Sanford, Cameron Cuffy, Pedro Collins, Dinanath Ramnarine, Ryan Hinds.

Mail Cricket Editor