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Rejoice! Harbhajan Singh has finally taken some wickets again. And they mattered for a change, since India have been looking to put one past England for quite some time now. Rejoice more, for even Piyush Chawla was made to look a decent pick for ICC World Twenty20, such was the hapless display of Andy Flower's batsmen.

But that is where the celebration should end. For, MS Dhoni and Duncan Fletcher probably went into Sunday's game hoping for some answers. And they found none. Stop a man walking his dog on the streets of Colombo and his canine friend will tell you that India doesn't boast of a bowling attack that can win this tournament. After beating Afghanistan, twice Dhoni claimed that he would be playing five bowlers in the inconsequential England match. The fact that both Zaheer Khan and R Ashwin were rested made it seem nothing more than a practice match

Yes, the two of them weren't needed given the implosion of the English batting order. That is not the point. This was a god-sent opportunity for India to see if the five-bowler theory works out for real. By not playing their two strike bowlers, they failed to see how they might be able to balance out twenty overs among five options should the need arise. Forget that, even the part-timers didn't get a bowl, so we don't know for sure how this theory sits in Dhoni's plans, if at all.

The Indian skipper has made no bones of the fact that he might be open to playing five bowlers at some later stage in the tournament. That inevitably has to be the Super Eights, for going further would depend on beating two out of Australia, Pakistan and South Africa. In the last two World Twenty20s, in 2009 and 2010, India do not boast of a very good record in the Super Eight stages. What skewers their chances even more is the simple fact that these three teams play spin better than their last opponents
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Dhoni can only play a fifth bowler if he chooses to rest a batsman. While the batting looks good on paper, it is over-reliant on Virat Kohli at the moment. He has been hitting runs at a clip ala Sachin Tendulkar in the 90s. While that comparison is a big indicator of his form, it also reminds us of the small fact that, back then, India failed to win if Tendulkar didn't score. Going back two decades certainly isn't part of the plan here.
This is where India's batting order on Sunday proved to be a stickler. If they were seeing this as a practice opportunity for the bowlers on the bench, why wasn't the same standard applied to the batsmen?
Yuvraj Singh has still got the same touch, on return from his illness, yes. But the doubt now remains over his form. Has he spent enough time in the middle or like Rohit Sharma, is the team management satisfied with his work-out in the nets? So why wasn't Yuvraj sent out ahead at No. 3 and afforded a chance to spend nearly 15 overs at the crease? The big point of contention here are the team sheets. When the India line-up was distributed in the press box, it listed Kohli to partner Gautam Gambhir at the top of the order. So, how did Irfan Pathan win his promotion in the space of just 30 minutes, between toss and the first ball?

While on Rohit, it was good to see him get some runs when it mattered for once. However both he Dhoni need some time to get going before playing the big shots, which means that India will be crowded for space in the middle overs for someone to push things along. That essentially puts onus on Suresh Raina and up to a certain extent on Yuvraj to start hitting out from scratch. Wouldn't you want them to be in prime form for this job then? Neither of the two got a chance to bat on Sunday evening.
With this seven batsmen or five bowler conundrum, India have one more option going ahead, one which everyone is neglecting. That is to do with the openers Gambhir and Virender Sehwag, the latter rested against England. You can see why Gambhir played the match. He needs practice. In case of Sehwag, well, there's no use of practice really. Even so, his absence provided an escape route for the team management.
If, and that is a big if, going forward, the two Indian openers continue to be patchy, Dhoni can opt to drop one of them and go ahead with Irfan as the opener. Now here's the catch. Both of them haven't gotten runs for quite a while. Gambhir looked good against England but needs to carry on. Sehwag will always play the way he does, but there comes a time when you need to buckle down and score something big. If Chris Gayle can play watchfully at the start, so can Sehwag.

It leads to two chains of thoughts here. One, India play seven batsmen and Sehwag is given the license to go after the bowling, like always. Or two, India give in, drop one of their openers, otherwise retaining the same batting order and ask Irfan to open. If it comes to throwing your bat at anything and everything, he can do an equal job of scoring 10-15 runs, given the poor form at the top of the order.

It is not the best approach, but beggars cannot be choosers. Especially when there's no telling if even five bowlers will be good enough to save the day, such is the ferocity of Twenty20 cricket.