As New Zealand's bowlers thoughtfully put away the bouncer as a mark of respect to the late Phillip Hughes, India's used it liberally in an intra-squad match. While neither approach is wrong, India's was more right.

Murali Vijay was at the crease at the start, as he will be for India whenever the Test series begins.

He had only faced a couple of deliveries when he was confronted by his first bouncer, from Umesh Yadav. And then another. And then, soon after, another, with Yadav the main aggressor and Varun Aaron only slightly more restrained.

The most hostile bowling, to the majority of India's specialist batsmen, on Saturday at Adelaide Oval came in the second half of the intra-squad training session, from Ishant Sharma.

The tall paceman made his name in Australia almost seven years ago by doing the unthinkable: rattling Ricky Ponting with pace and bounce. During the onerous session lasting 4½ hours, he bowled like he was trying to reinforce that reputation.

Just a day earlier, New Zealand's pacemen symbolically put away the bouncer for the resumption of their Test against Pakistan for the first time since the death of Phillip Hughes.

"We didn't have anyone under the close field and under a helmet and didn't bowl any bouncer, and that was to show respect," Black Caps coach Mike Hesson explained.

Two teams, two vastly contrasting approaches to fast-bowling.

That the New Zealanders were so thoughtful does not therefore mean the Indians, who bowled in front of the iconic scoreboard emblazoned with "Vale Phillip Hughes 1988 - 2014", were not.

Neither approach was wrong, but I would argue the Indians' response was more right.

To stop bowling bouncers undermines the messages of support to the bowler whose delivery felled Hughes, Sean Abbott. It is effectively saying "You did nothing wrong ... but we're not going to do that thing you did".

One of the best lessons on how Abbott, and in turn all other pacemen, should respond came from Hughes' distraught state coach at South Australia, Darren Berry, on the day of his protege's death.

"My heart like many is broken tonight but my thoughts also to NSW Sean Abbott. Stay strong & continue to bowl fast mate. No fault / No blame," Berry tweeted.

The bouncer is an integral part of cricket. Mitch Johnson's thrilling use of it last summer in Australia and then South Africa, at rapid speed, was among the greatest fillips for Test cricket in the past decade.

For bowlers it is a way to prevent batsmen becoming too settled on the front foot, even in conditions not conducive to fast-bowling.

On the first day of the Test in the UAE, NZ pacemen Trent Boult, Tim Southee and Corey Anderson bowled about eight overs of bouncers between them, with Anderson and Southee particularly fond of the tactic.

In the 10 overs of pace delivered by the Black Caps on the second day there were none, as had been agreed beforehand in their dressing rooms.

Pakistan, in response, waited until only the third over of the innings to go short, with Mohammad Talha the main aggressor.

It was during this period that opposition captain Brendon McCullum gave a brutal reminder that bouncers, the deliveries with the potential to be so valuable for bowlers, can be exploited by confident batsmen, especially when their aim is awry.

The feisty McCullum thrived on the bouncers, profiting with at least three boundaries as he raced to his century from just 78 deliveries, a record for a New Zealander.

The Pakistan players were hurting over Hughes' death; the abrupt abandonment of play on Thursday and extension of the Test by a day reiterated that. Their willingness to bowl short did nothing to contradict or undermine that.

For India's players to have put away the bouncer in their intra-squad match would have undermined their preparation, which was already threadbare with the cancellation of the second of two two-day matches.

For them to assume Johnson and his ilk would not bowl bouncers to them would be foolish. So too must Aaron and Ishant keep practising them, for the likes of David Warner and Steve Smith will expect them, whenever they are capable of resuming playing.

Similarly, well-intentioned gestures like naming Hughes as opener in the first Test team and playing one batsman short, or naming him as 12th man for the entire series, are the antithesis of the hard-nosed approach Hughes encountered when beginning his first-class career eight years ago, and deliberately cultivated since then.

Affected players should be given as long as they need to recover, with the guarantee that the duration of their stint away from the game will not count against their future selection prospects.

Once they are back, however, they should be encouraged to play as fiercely as they always have.