Cricket: Complete Guide To The World Cup

IF THE Gods of batting had arrayed themselves over the Taunton cricket ground on this balmy Wednesday morning, who would blame even them for being enchanted by the ambrosial batting of Rahul Dravid and Saurav Ganguly? So sublime was the heady concoction they served that it would be a travesty to merely report that they created a new world record and erased several others. What unfolded here was an incandescent batting fiesta so majestic that even those who watched it felt like royalty ... Such was the dazzling display of the two princes of Indian batting that for once the King himself, Tendulkar, was a mere flicker ... Dravid played such a delectable innings that 8,500 people must have been giddy even without the beer that flowed in the stands as they savoured the champagne batting. Ganguly was a magic wand to Dravid's scimitar, languid poetry to flowing prose ... He is now in such prime form that he could make tons with a table leg. The India Express waxes lyrical about a celestial vision at Taunton.

The South Africans have an off day on Thursday and Cronje expressed disappointment that the famous Van Gough museum is closed until late June. "There are other ways of entertaining yourselves," said one scribe in reference to Amsterdam's red light district. "Oh, then I'd better tell Herschelle Gibbs," quipped Cronje. Johannesburg's Star on the dilemmas of free time.