I went to secondary school with a nice girl whose family had migrated from India. She was in my year-eleven German class. Of course she loved cricket and of course we talked about it at the expense of the curriculum.

It just so happened that she had been neighbours with Sourav Ganguly, who was India's captain at the time. She was very fond of Ganguly, both as a person and as a cricketer.

One day I made the mistake of suggesting that Ganguly's output as a batsman seemed disproportionate to his immense standing in Indian cricket.

She was bemused. How could I dislike Ganguly? He was a star. I immediately recognised the futility of my approach.  As the Indian writer Aravind Adiga once wrote, I might as well have been a eunuch talking about the Kama Sutra.

Once a star, always a star in Indian cricket (with the possible exception of Mohammad Azharuddin). A star determines when his time is up.  No unfavourable statistic, no form slump, no rational argument, can belie this enduring truth. Ask Greg Chappell.

Wouldn't Ricky Ponting have loved such certainty during the past three months?

For over a decade, the Indian batting line-up has had a familiar ring to it at Test level. Rahul Dravid has batted at No.3.  Sachin Tendulkar - the Little Master - has batted at four.  VVS Laxman has batted at five.  And for the majority of this time, Sourav Ganguly has occupied the number six slot.

Virender Sehwag has been a mainstay at the top of the order and, in the past three years, Gautum Gambhir has provided great support as his opening partner.

This has allowed little scope for emerging batsmen to gain exposure at Test level.  Since Ganguly's retirement, Indian cricket fans have witnessed a ‘rotation' policy almost as farcical as Australia's spin bowling policy.

Last time India visited down under, Yuvraj Singh performed dreadfully at No.6. He ultimately lost his spot in the team.  The subsequent batting reshuffle meant that Irfan Pathan - a swing bowler - was opening the batting by the end of the tour.

Since then a number of players have earned the right to bat at No.6 and have been promptly discarded.

When Australia toured India for a hastily arranged two-test series in 2009, injuries afforded Cheteshwar Pujara a chance in the second Test.  He performed commendably in the second innings, scoring 72 and helping India to a seven-wicket victory.

Pujara was dropped during the team's fiercely fought three-Test series in South Africa in 2010.  Suresh Raina was also tried in South Africa.  His technique unravelled against good quality short-pitched bowling from Dale Steyn, Morne Morkel and Lonwabo Tsotsobe.

During the team's ill-fated tour of England last year, the rotation policy came full circle when Yuvraj Singh was re-instated into the side. 

Yuvraj looked remarkably jumpy at the crease and appeared as though he wanted to don his pyjamas and play some ‘real' cricket.  It's difficult watching someone so talented and experienced simply not try hard enough.  For the first two-thirds of Andrew Symonds' career, I felt the same way about him.

Now Virat Kohli finds himself in the spotlight.  He performed very well during India's recent home series against the West Indies, although his lazy dismissal (for 63) on the final day of the Mumbai test ultimately cost his side victory.

So far Kohli has appeared to be a rabbit in the headlights in Australia; an angry rabbit.  In the SCG Test he was fined half of his match fee for making an obscene gesture towards the crowd.

Kohli has always had a fiery temperament.  Three years ago, during an Indian Premier League match, he was hooked up to a microphone whilst fielding (one of my pet hates in Twenty20 cricket, incidentally).  He provided the commentators with a rather flippant summation of the match, as is every sportsman's right given such ludicrous circumstances.

The commentators then misjudged the bowler's run-up and continued the interview with Kohli while the ball was in play.  He subsequently misfielded at short fine leg, conceding an extra run.

When the commentators rightfully apologised to Kohli, he said, ‘Shit happens.'

Kohli is a good player who, like Pujara, Raina and the untried Rohit Sharma, is potentially a fine Test batsman.  He needs a good run in the team.  The Indian selectors have a nasty penchant for dispensing with inexperienced batsman during overseas tours. 

This might sound rather pretentious, but sometimes the very factors that make Indian cricket so brilliant also serve as its Achilles heel.

India has fed many young, promising players into its side in the shorter forms in recent years.  They won the 2011 World Cup without Laxman and Dravid.  I'm not suggesting it's time for the ‘stars' to fade into that good night.  But it's a conundrum.  Such is Indian cricket.