In response to Dhoni's latest statement

Dhoni lashed out at the selectors yesterday during a presser.


 Speaking to HT before boarding the flight to Sydney, Dhoni lamented how he would give a list of players to the selectors only to find many of them he wanted not named in the squad. “I don't have a say in selection. I ask for certain players, send it in writing to the selectors and when the squad is announced their names are missing,” said Dhoni.

My two points regarding Dhoni's statement -


1 ) Dhoni speaking against the cricket board . It shows that there is a complete communication breakdown between the selectors and the team. The team has no idea about what the selectors are on about . It was clearly highlighted when there was a news regarding Dravid's retirement . When the BCCI was asked whether they had any clue about the retirement , the official replied in the negative .


2) Dhoni's word shouldnt be taken while selecting the team . 
He asked for a half fit Rudra Pratap Singh during the tour of England . The left-arm seamer arrived looked well-rested and plump and even though the selectors tried hard, they just couldn’t hide the fact that he was clearly unfit. How could RP get into the team . I wont answer this question but all i will say is he is managed by the same company that manages Dhoni. (The management company, Rhiti Sports Management run by Arun Pandey ,Dhoni’s childhood friend and  manager). Raina never looked comfortable in tests played overseas . Everyone knows about his weakness against short pitched deliveries . I wont tell ( i dont know , actually ) how he got selected for England .All i can say is -he is also contracted with Rhiti Sports. Another thing about Rhiti sport - the exclusive marketing rights for Chennai Super Kings (CSK) are with them . 

If Dhoni picks players like RP for important tours , then i dont think he should be ever allowed to represent his thoughts during selection . 

More importantly these arent the kind of statements one should make during a important tour . It highlights a loss of mind , the state of affairs in the management and the relation between the players and the board .  

Indian Squad for ODIs/tri-series - 1) MS Dhoni

The Indians are scheduled to play two Twenty20 matches on February 1 and 2, followed by the tri-series, also involving Sri Lanka, from February 5. 




M S Dhoni (C), Virender Sehwag (VC), Sachin Tendulkar, Gautam Gambhir, Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma, Suresh Raina, Ravindra Jadeja, R Ashwin, Unesh Yadav, Praveen Kumar, R Vinay Kumar, Manoj Tiwary, Rahul Sharma, Parthiv Patel, Irfan Pathan and Zaheer Khan.

MS Dhoni :- 

Recent scores  - 12 , 2 , 57 , 2 , 6 , 23 , 3 , 5 , 8 , 13.  
* 1 score of 50+ in last 10 innings .

Dhoni isnt in the best of forms . However he is  a different batsman in ODIs and t20s . He has come under severe criticism because of his failure as a captain and player . So he will be trying his best to prove a point to the selectors and his critics . 

His scores in his last 10 ODIs - 75 , 15 , 35 , 87 , 50 , 78 , 69 , 6 , 33 , 91. 

Some reasons why he is being criticised by one and all - 



 Removing forward short leg and silly point when new batsmen are tentatively poking around is a recipe for disaster. Ricky Ponting, Michael Hussey and Michael Clarke were allowed to play themselves back to form in this manner;
* Pushing the field back, thus, allowing easy singles is tailor-made to ease the pressure on batsmen. The three Aussies referred to above as well as Ian Bell, Alistair Cook and Kevin Peterson all benefited hugely from this;
* Resuming the post-lunch session on Day 4 of the Lords Test with part-timer Suresh Raina when Ishant Sharma was on fire and raring to go allowed England to claw its way back in that Test;
* If one opposition batsman has scored a triple century and three others have crossed the 200-mark over the last six away Tests, then something is very, very wrong;
* If lower order opposition batsmen are consistently adding 100 runs-plus in every innings, then there’s something wrong with the way the fielding side is being led.
* Chasing 180-odd runs to win the final Test match against the West Indies at Roseau, India abandoned the chase and settled for a draw with 85 to get from 15 overs @ less than six runs per over.


The ODI series will be a huge test for Dhoni . Further failure might result in him being scrapped from captaincy (test
 matches) .  


Dhoni averages 69 in Australia ( ODIs ) . India will need their captain to fire in what is going to be a battle of epic proportions .  

                                                                                     

Time to introspect

If you are a cricket fan who likes to trace out the ‘culprit ‘ of a match or a tour, or if you are really interested in ‘who are accountable’ for the performance of the team in any specific tour or test match, then this piece isn’t for you. Instead of going for someone’s throat or claiming that ‘this/that player should be axed’, I am going to break down the reasons behind the failure of the Indian cricket team in the first two tests versus Australia (Melbourne and Sydney), into smaller parts to help you understand the situation better.


There is no doubt in the fact that India is one of the best test teams in the world, on paper at least, and at home. If you have these players in your side; Virender Sehwag, Gautam Gambhir, Rahul Dravid, Tendulkar, V.V.S Laxman, Virat Kohli, Dhoni; more often than not you are expected to win. But, the team’s performance in the last couple of years, especially on foreign soil, has been very ordinary.


After 24 Jan 2008, Tests played outside the subcontinent (by subcontinent, I mean the combined landmass of Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and India):


Played 17 Won 3
Lost 8
Draw 6


Last 9 matches away from home:
Won 0
Lost 7
Draw 2


Since Jan 1, 2011. Test matches lost:
India 7
Sri Lanka 2
West Indies 2
Pakistan 1
Australia 1
New Zealand 1
Bangladesh 1


Captaincy:


A good captain should possess nerves of steel, he should be inapprehensive, unflinching, tactically aggressive,  determined and have the will to win. He should be flexible (ability to bring a change in the pre-planned tactics when required), should be a good mind-reader and last but not the least, he should be a good motivator; man of action.


Kumar Sangakara was finagler, one of the finest examples of how a captain manages his resources well. Sri Lanka have limited resources, but he has made the best possible use of it. Misbah-Ul-Haq’s contribution to Pakistani cricket, as a captain ,I believe will be acknowledged once his tenure runs out. He is a team man, never panics, has the support of the players and in my opinion, the man responsible for the ‘resurgence’ of Pakistan cricket. Andrew Strauss with the support of Andy Flower has changed the fortunes of the English team. Our very own Sourav Ganguly leads the race when it comes to tactical aggression, belligerence and being a genuine leader.


Dhoni succeeded Kumble as the captain of the Test side. In the first few years, he was very successful and had a good win/loss ratio. The Test team was faring well and so was the ODI team. There was no one who had any issues with his captaincy. The team won the World Cup under his captaincy, and he was lauded by one and all. Dhoni’s success, in my opinion shouldn’t have been surprising. When you have so many potential match-winners in the side; people like Dravid, Sachin, Laxman in your test batting line up. Add that too good spinners, you have to be really a hapless captain to lose matches. With so many senior players he didn’t need to be the mentor-guide to the team, he just needed to keep it in good fettle. He never had to display pugnacity to prove his leadership abilities. The team performed well enough without that. Nobody ever blamed him for missing the fighting spirit. The spirit is missing at the moment.


Knives are out for Dhoni after the losses in England and now in Australia. The flaws in his captaincy have been highlighted. It is now believed that he was just not good enough to achieve whatever he has achieved so far. He has been lucky far too long; it’s time for a reality check. Dhoni scores low when it comes to field placements. He was criticized for setting defensive fields after sending 4/5 opposition batsmen to the pavilion conceding a few runs. He isn’t a great motivator, since, till now he never felt the need to do so. In Test matches, unlike other captains, you rarely see him walking to the bowler and giving him some advice.


There have been plenty of instances when the quick’s, like Zaheer and Ishant, have provided the break-through, but India have failed to capitalize on it. What Dhoni has done is, his gone for defensive fields, men in the deep protecting the boundaries. Even in the series in England he was found guilty of setting defensive fields, taking off the third slip fielder very early. Dhoni, asking a man to field at short point, forward-short-leg against quicks, is indeed a uncommon sight. One could see that Clarke had a man at forward-short-leg against India.


India in South Africa Test Series – Jan 2, 2011


South Africa were reduced to 2-34 and then 4-164, but they fought back and scored 362. In the second innings, they found themselves at 5-89, but again they managed to score 364.


India tour of England, 2011


1st Test: In their 2nd innings England were 5-62 at one stage, but they ended up scoring 6-269 (declared).


2nd Test: England were at 8-124 at one stage, but they ended up the final score of 221. In the 2nd innings England were 6-339 and managed a mammoth score of 544 runs in that innings.


India tour of Australia, 2011/12


1st Test: In the 1st innings, Australia after being 6-214 scored 333 . They were 4-27 at one stage in their 2nd innings but in spite of that they posted a total of 240.


These are only a few examples, there have been many such occasions when teams have taken advantage of his defensive field-placements.


Batting


People seem to have taken it for granted that India has the best batting line up. Is this true?
In the last 13 months India has played 11 test matches;
Scores above 500 – none
above 400 – once
above 300- thrice


Opening has been a major issue. The injury prone, Sehwag and Gambhir have disappointed in Tests. Their replacements (Murali Vijay and Mukund) don’t seem to have the class to deliver the goods at the highest level. Also they have never been given enough chances to prove their mettle. Openers haven’t been able to leave the ball well. Gambhir, in most matches edges to the wk/slip cordon, Sehwag chases for deliveries outside off and invites trouble. Gambhir had it in him to play knocks of substance, but these days he looks very tentative with his foot movement against deliveries on the off stump.


Only Sachin and Dravid, look somewhat assured against fast bowling. Both of them are good leavers of the ball and know where their off-stump is. Especially Sachin leaves the ball on the 3rd /4th stump better than anyone. This has been the weakness of Sehwag, Laxman and Dhoni; all 3 of them have unique techniques. Laxman has a tendency to play away from his body, especially the cover drives, his back foot doesn’t move much . He has been able to survive with his technique all these years, but that doesn’t seem to be working these days. Sehwag hardly moves his feet but his ability to pick the line of the ball quickly and time the ball well even without much feet movement helps him. Dhoni’s technique is difficult to describe, his walking-cover-drive has resulted in his downfall too many times. These three have an exceptional hand-eye coordination which has been of immense help to them in their careers.


Against the short ball, Dravid and Laxman seem somewhat assured; Sachin doesn’t play the pull shot these days. Sehwag and Gambhir have never been good pullers. Same is the case with rest of the batting line up. How can you win Tests abroad ( ]especially in England, S Africa and Australia) if 9 out of 11 of your batsmen are poor on their backfoot ?. When a player is unsure about his backfoot play, the bowler bangs a few short, and then he bowls a fuller one. The batsman, expects another short ball and stays on his back foot, he edges it and perishes. This is where England score high, their top 5 batsmen, Cook, Strauss, Trott, KP and Bell have very good techniques and more importantly they are good players on the off-stump; equally good on the front-foot and backfoot.


India doesn’t have a settled batsman at number 6. Raina’s weakness against short-pitched stuff compelled the management to throw him out. Yuvraj Singh never looked comfortable at 6 and Virat Kohli averages 15 odd in overseas Tests. He is a talented player, majestic on the front foot. His back-foot play needs to improve. Rohit Sharma who is known for his technique against fast-bowling has been never given the opportunity to prove himself. The selectors continue to neglect Badrinath, experienced and a prolific scorer in Ranji.
                              
                                      Opening partnerships (2011) 

                                 
                                               Runs scored (2011)

  








So basically , this is what has happened in most of the matches


1) Openers fall early
2) Hopes pinned on Dravid and Sachin
3) Most of the times the duo come to the rescue . at around 80 , team loses the third wicket
4) The remaining 6 make another 140/150 and the team gets all out within 250

BCCI still in the cocoon of denial


1) Utter lack of preparation, planning and practice. The English team reached Australia well before the Ashes, but the Indians played against West Indies in a rather needless 5 match ODI series at home, on dustbowls. The time that could have been utilized to prepare for the major series was wasted.


2) Playing IPL has had an adverse impact on the technique of the batsmen. In Test cricket you need to be good at two things, leaving the ball and knowing where the off-stump is. The Indian batsmen have forgotten how to leave the balls on the off stump. In T20s you are advised not to waste deliveries, put bat to ball and rotate strike. There are people like Kohli and Gambhir who don’t seem to like leaving the ball even if the ball is pitched on the 5th or 6th stump outside off. Majority of the batsmen these days, in Ranji Trophy and International cricket try to reach out and hit every ball. So the bowlers keep them fishing outside off. Knowing they are going to nick one and get caught behind the stumps. I can assure you every aspiring young cricketer in the country would prefer seeing his name in the scoreboard of an IPL match. The honour’s board at Lord’s means nothing to them.


3) Playing excessive T20s affects the bowlers more than anyone else. When a bowler constantly bowls short bursts at batsman who are out to hammer him, his bowling action is put under severe stress, its gives him bad habbits, the bowler fears to pitch the ball on the good length and on the fourth stump because that will allow the batsman to get under the delivery. Even while playing ODIs on the flat Indian pitches, you either bowl full or pitch it on the short of good length, with the ball directed towards the batsman’s body. Ishant Sharma has been a degraded bowler ever since he started playing IPL.


4) The BCCI was supposed to conduct a detailed review of the England tour. That never happened, instead, they met a few times to discuss the future of the IPL Kochi franchise. The day on which India lost the 2nd Test match at Sydney, the BCCI members met, to finalise the schedule of the 5th edition of IPL. When asked to comment on the horror run in England, Rajiv Shukla said “ We are absolutely happy because we want cricket to grow in England “.


5) Subramaniam Badrinath, Rohit Sharma and Ajinkya Rahane have the best batting averages in domestic cricket. None of them is in the playing XI.


6) Only a mentally illlusioned cricket board will expect indoor nets and 10-15 day batting camps to produce cricketers of Sachin or Dravid’s calibre.


7) The MRF pace foundation is a private initiative. The board could have made use of it. Instead they have this useless specialist academies.


8) There has never been a sincere effort to build a proper ‘A’ team and send them to play emerging nations tournaments . No one has bothered to select players for the A tours who can compete for places in Australia, those who don’t slog and can think beyond 20s and 30s. Sending players to Australia for emerging players tournaments on the basis of performances in IPL, is like making a serious joke of the entire domestic cricket structure.


9) No one has the guts to nudge any senior player. How poor his form maybe, he still plays and the guys scoring tons of runs in domestic cricket are never rewarded.


10) The richest cricket board still doesn’t have a decent injury management system and database. The board members say it is ‘expensive'.




India aren’t playing tests abroad till December 2013. This is the time to blood youngsters. I believe it would have been a lot better had the team lost with Rohit and Rahane in the side rather than the seniors in England and Australia. The seniors, Dravid, Sachin and Laxman have hardly 3 years of cricket left in them. Selectors have their job cut out, find good enough replacements. One good option can be to replace one senior every year with a newbie. That will make the transition smoother. The batting line up which used to look like this; Sehwag, Gambhir, Dravid, Sachin, Laxman, Ganguly and  Dhoni will be somewhat like this after a couple of years; Gambhir, Rahane/Sehwag, Pujara, Rohit, Kohli, Dhoni and Raina. I won’t be surprised if India drops further down in the Test rankings in the years to come. The selectors haven’t really bothered to induce fresh blood into the side. India won’t be able to enjoy the services of the golden trio for long. It’s going to be a testing time for the selectors, asking people who has served the country for almost two decades won’t be easy.


I believe, frequent batting collapses, failure of the top order to score runs and ordinary bowling, aren’t destroying Indian cricket; neglect and the  lack of vision are . And the former are the symptoms of the latter.

PAYBACK

Team India will have revenge on their mind and heart  when the five-match ODI series against England begin with the opener at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium in Hyderabad tomorrow.Just a few months after the horrible unforgettable  summer  which saw the former getting thrashed and the latter being crowned Number One Test side in the world , INDIA will be pretty desperate to prove that they are the world champions in 50-50 cricket.

Things are going to be pretty different this time around.Its too earlier predict , but things wont be that easy for England playing against India at home ,with their fanatical fans team india are a very different proposition.

India are the current World Champions at the 50-over format & have a very formidable home record with only the Australians in 2009 & 2007 defeating them in their last 13 home ODI series. But that said the team played most of the matches with a full-strength side. New Zealand were an easy opposition.The side didn’t have a batsman who looked comfortable against spin, plus with a couple of inexperienced youngsters in their side they were no match for team india .

England never had a record playing in the subcontinent.Their  last two tours have seen an aggregate score of 11-1 in favour of India with the 2008/09 series ending 5-0.Because of the terrorist attacks in Mumbai , two matches were  abandoned saving them from further humiliation.One who had watched that series will tell you that they were thoroughly outplayed in every department . Moreover, they haven’t won an ODI series in India for about 25 years. But  these days things are not the same.England are a stronger unit & made of sterner stuff with a good number of exciting young emerging talents thrown into the mix,thanks to the English selectors who possess a considerable amount of foresight. With convincing home series victories over Sri Lanka and India already secured under the captaincy of Alaistar cool Cook the future looks bright for this  side filled with young blood and excitement.  But this tour of India will be probably  their toughest assignment yet and we will learn a lot about just how far England have come by the end of it.  With their weakened bowling including lack of decent spin options excluding the outstanding Graeme Swann, I feel India have the edge in what should be an competitive & close series




Following the test and ODI series at home England look to concentrate on creating a specialist side for both formats of the games , respectively.,Clearly the NO 1 rank in ODIs in on their mind.On that note , this series should give us a good idea about whether England's masterplan for world domination in every form of cricket is on course, but this time around its unlikely to be one-way traffic.But record books will tell you that  England have struggled in India, winning only one of their last 13 One Day Internationals on indian pitches .And considering the fact that England wont be able to enjoy the services of a few of their top players, any little success enjoyed in this series will be considered as a  real statement of intent from Ali Cook’s men.





Yes…The Indian team is still struggling with injuries that seriously hampered their chances in England with the key players  Virender Sehwag, Sachin Tendulkar, Yuvraj Singh, Rohit Sharma, Zaheer Khan, Ishant Sharma and Munaf Patel not fully recovered.But in my opinion  the young and inexperienced( using the term inexperienced might invite controversy since some of these guys have gained enough experience at international level) side, which will also be without Harbhajan Singh who was dropped, has enough arsenal to win in home conditions..In 2011 on  home turf team india-
played 14 ODIs
 won 12  1 tied
 this gives us enough cause to remember that they are World Champions in this format of the game
 

 INDIAN TEAM
You can expect the the team  to continue with Parthiv Patel and Ajinkya Rahane as openers after their impressive performances in England with the aggressive Gautam Gambhir, who is back for the first two ODIs at least, at no 3. and there is a chance he could be joined soon by a fit-again Virender Sehwag at the top of the order. Virat Kohli, who has been in fine form in the Champions League T20, will be at No 4 followed by Suresh Raina and MS Dhoni with Ravindra Jadeja as the bowling all-rounder.. He hit 107 in the last ODI in Cardiff & has continued his fine form in the Champions League playing for the Royal Challengers Bangalore with scores of 70 & 84 not out in the semi final.SURESH RAINA-He scored an incredible 84 in the 4^th ODI vs England.He has great natural ability and hits the ball incredibly hard.



While the batting looks solid despite missing several key players, the bowling will worry the think-tank.




Apart from Praveen Kumar, the pace bowling lacks experience with Sreenath Arvind, Umesh Yadav, R VInay Kumar and Varun Aaron in the ranks.Alot is expected from Ashwin , a lot has been spoken about his variations and usefullness in the shorter format of the game.He definitely will try to prove a point or two and that he is a better bowler than Harbhajan. India could well prepare turning tracks which will make things difficult for the English batsmen and the side will be looking at Trott and Pietersen to deal with the spin threat
How the bowlers fare against the English batting could well decide the fate of the first two ODIs after which the selectors will meet to pick the squad for the following games.



The Indian bowlers' inability to take wickets in England saw them go down rather tamely despite posting some handy totals and the visitors will take a lot of confidence from those performances.




England have several quality batsmen in their side and the return of Kevin Pietersen, who was dropped for the home series against India, makes the middle order look solid.





Skipper Alastair Cook will continue his role as the sheet-anchor at the top of the order with Craig Kieswetter looking to attack.
Jonathan Trott and Ian Bell also had a lot of success against Indians in England and the hosts would do well to chalk out specific plans for them.
England too are short on experience on the bowling front and the Indian batsmen will be looking to make the most of it.






With spearhead James Anderson rested and Stuart Broad injured, Tim Bresnan will lead the attack with Steve Finn and Jade Dernbach making up the attack while Grame Swann will be the lone specialist spinner and Samit Patel likely to play as the spinning all-rounder. Swann is undoubtedly the best spinner in the world currently but the Indians are fantastic players of spin.So it will be interesting to see if he can be able to trouble Indian batsmen after a good show on pitches which were spinner-unfriendly. Jade Dernbach is another  man who needs to be watched out. He has made himself a vital part of the England attack in the last year with his excellent array of slower balls. These variations will be used in the power plays & end of the innings, increasing his chances of a number of cheap wickets whilst the batsmen are looking to take advantage of the fielding restrictions.









Probable teams:
India: Parthiv Patel, Ajinkya Rahane, Gautam Gambir, Virat Kohli, Suresh Raina, MS Dhoni, Ravindra Jadeja, R Ashwin, Praveen Kumar, R VInay Kumar, Umesh Yadav
England: Alastair Cook, Craig Kieswetter, Jonathan Trott, Kevin Pietersen, Ian Bell, Ravi Bopara, Samit Patel, Tim Bresnan, Graeme Swann, Steve Finn, Jade Dernbach.


WHAT CAPTAINS SAY-

COOK-

I don’t see any relation between what happened in England and what’s going
to happen out here. India are historically very strong at home, and we have
an extremely tough challenge on our hands. It’s a great opportunity for an
England side to play the world champions in their back yard.

DHONI-

We may have not been up to the mark in England, but the fact is that before
that tour, we won the game’s biggest prize, the World Cup. Our performances
over the past three seasons speak for themselves. I am convinced that it is
only a matter of time before we turn the tide.

WHAT ELSE YOU WILL SEE

New ODI rules. Dhoni said the five ODI’s “may not see reverse-swing”
due to the use of a new ball from each end. Counterpart Cook said “you
will see spin a lot earlier” during games. Rules stipulate that bowling
and batting powerplays must be completed between the 16th and 40th overs of
the innings.

You will notice three stars above the BCCI logo on India’s ODI shirts. They
denote euphoric wins in the 1983 and 2011 World Cups as well as the 2007
World T20.

TAKING the batting ,fieldind,and bowling line ups of both teams into account I feel it might be 3-2 England J