India tour of New Zealand - Jan to Feb 2014

[War]

. We need to drop Ashwin immediately and give someone like Mishra or Ojha a chance. Ashwin has never been a good one day bowler but now he is getting even worse.

Up to this morning my Indian friend here in England was saying this with anger ha. Then i had a look at Ashwin's ODI record & i was surprised to see he hasn't yet taken a 4 wicket haul, much less a 5 for in the format.

I probably haven't been watching him that attentively in ODIs -but has he really been bowling that badly?.

 

[grkrama]

Its more about bowling to defensively,he doesn't even seem to be aiming for wickets and his explanation that he is just looking to plug one end when bowling in powerplay etc is also not good.
He has become another harbhajan too quickly, started of well but turned defensive, though he has age on his side and with some good tweaking especially the mental aspect he can start getting wickets, in the meanwhile it will do the team a lot of good if mishra or ojha gets a look in.

 

[asprin]

With all the bashing going around, I suddenly realized that India haven't performed that poorly. 3 games could have gone either side - only the 4th and 5th ODIs were convincing wins. Add to that almost 90% of the squad was playing in NZ for the first time and that makes those 3 close games even more admirable.

NZ were the underdogs and full credit to them for the way they played, but I think India didn't perform as badly as the scoreline suggests. A bit of luck here and there and the series may well have been 2-2 going into the final game.

I'm really looking forward to the Tests and I feel India will only improve from here on.

 

[grkrama]

Rohit's talent is something special. I remember many ex-cricketers (national as well as international) tipping Rohit to become the next big thing in Indian cricket. IIRC, there were even "Next Tendulkar" chants going on. It's a pity he is wasting all of it though.

Ya he is talented ,elegant like you said got noticed by many ex-cricketers,esp Ian Chappel i dont remember the last batsman that impressed him.
But Sourav told once its one thing to look talented and other to translate it to performance,after over 7 years he is still not performed well despite the umpteen chances.yes he did have a goldrush from CT,WI to aus tour.But
no where enough to do justice and he is certainly bogging down his partner by not rotating.

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With all the bashing going around, I suddenly realized that India haven't performed that poorly. 3 games could have gone either side - only the 4th and 5th ODIs were convincing wins. Add to that almost 90% of the squad was playing in NZ for the first time and that makes those 3 close games even more admirable.

NZ were the underdogs and full credit to them for the way they played, but I think India didn't perform as badly as the scoreline suggests. A bit of luck here and there and the series may well have been 2-2 going into the final game.

I'm really looking forward to the Tests and I feel India will only improve from here on.

The scoreline is more misleading than actual facts ,we didnt field well, bowling was horrible to say the least, batting openers performed n only one match, kholi ,jadu and dhoni have been carrying the whole wait of batting so its actually misleading enough to suggest that we performed well.
I dont like criticsing our team but its the right time to make the required changes if we are to retain the WC and improve overseas performances.

 

[asprin]

If I got this right, even a 4-0 scoreline doesn't do justice to how badly India played to find it misleading?

 

[grkrama]

i meant scorecard loss by 16 runs, tie etc , not the win/loss themselves..
tbh yes India did perform as badly as 4-0 suggests,for the reasons i stated above.this is not to criticize this young team but hoping these get ironed out soon.

Positives :
Jadeja coming good in overseas conditions both with bat and ball.
Kholi going from strength to strength
Dhoni himself being rock solid.
Shami is ok.

Concerns:
Openers,No.4 ,No.5
Spin bowlers not able to take wickets.
Pace bowlers going for runs and not getting wickets.
Fielding intensity lesser than what was seen during CT.have to hide Aaron & Ashwin.


India has to sit and address these,the only solutions of the top of my head are
Batting : Get Pujara in,give Rahanae one more series instead roping Raina back in which is very likely.
Bowling: Actually only thing i can think is get Zak or Nehra back with WC in mind and have the other pacers rotate around them will
give them some experience to deal with situations.
Mishra or Ojha till Ashwin changes his defensive mentality and starts picking wickets.

 

[playkid12]

I don't understand why Nehra's name is being brought back by people in this forum. It just sounds like wishful thinking. It's been way too long since he's bowled for India. I don't see him ever coming back.

 

[grkrama]

Nehra is 34 a year younger than Zak is still active and doing well in FC ,was pretty decent in all his last outings for the teams he played,has good experience with death bowling, though cant say much about his fitness and fielding, just added him as an after thought, certainly he is better than ishant.

 

[surendar]

Yea if Ishant gives 70 runs in 10 overs, Nehra will give 65 runs in 10 overs. Agree, he is definitely better than Ishant!

Serious? Nehra?

 

[Aalay]

Up to this morning my Indian friend here in England was saying this with anger ha. Then i had a look at Ashwin's ODI record & i was surprised to see he hasn't yet taken a 4 wicket haul, much less a 5 for in the format.

I probably haven't been watching him that attentively in ODIs -but has he really been bowling that badly?.

The thing is, Ashwin was never a great ODI bowler but he was brought into the team because of his aggressive bowling, variations and Harbhajan's downfall. As we all know Harbhajan before he got dropped was bowling more to stop the runs rather than going for wickets. When Ashwin was brought into the ODI team, he looked to take wickets rather than thinking about runs. What he usually did was to chip in with a couple of wickets in the middle overs plus his excellent economy rate was always a bonus. However, since last year he hasn't done that. In champions trophy 2013, he performed ok but he was saved by Jadeja's amazing bowling. Afterwards, he has just struggled to get wickets in the middle overs. It is not because his mystery has been exposed or anything because I still think people find it tough to pick that carrom ball but he has just changed his attitude to defensive. He is slowly shifting in that Harbhajan mode where he is just thinking about stopping the runs rather than going for wickets because he is not getting help from the surface.

If you watch any of his interviews, it is very easy to see that he has an excellent cricket brain. However, right now I think he is making the situation a bit more complex by trying too many things. He has the ability to outthink the batsman but right now, he just needs a bit of a break which might prove good for him.

 

[shravi]

Does the team just expect Kohli to do everything? It's scandalous. One man team.

Kohli is the best ODI batsman in the world by such a distance it's NOT. EVEN. CLOSE.

 

[playkid12]

^ Almost seems like history is repeating itself. Tendulkar, 1 man team in the 90s. Kohli, 1 man team in the 2010's. Dravid, deemed a test specialist in the 90s. Pujara, deemed a test specialist in the 2010's. The only thing you need is a match fixing scandal to seal the deal. Hopefully, the IPL will bring it.

 

[War]

I would genuinely consider him, I still feel its far too early for Sodhi but the selectors love him so despite any bad performances he will remain in the team.

Yea selectors, like us fans have their player biases all over the world. But yea if Vettori's days are done - McCullum certainly looks like he could play a better role than Sodhi in the test format.

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The thing is, Ashwin was never a great ODI bowler but he was brought into the team because of his aggressive bowling, variations and Harbhajan's downfall. As we all know Harbhajan before he got dropped was bowling more to stop the runs rather than going for wickets. When Ashwin was brought into the ODI team, he looked to take wickets rather than thinking about runs. What he usually did was to chip in with a couple of wickets in the middle overs plus his excellent economy rate was always a bonus. However, since last year he hasn't done that. In champions trophy 2013, he performed ok but he was saved by Jadeja's amazing bowling. Afterwards, he has just struggled to get wickets in the middle overs. It is not because his mystery has been exposed or anything because I still think people find it tough to pick that carrom ball but he has just changed his attitude to defensive. He is slowly shifting in that Harbhajan mode where he is just thinking about stopping the runs rather than going for wickets because he is not getting help from the surface.

If you watch any of his interviews, it is very easy to see that he has an excellent cricket brain. However, right now I think he is making the situation a bit more complex by trying too many things. He has the ability to outthink the batsman but right now, he just needs a bit of a break which might prove good for him.

Hmm interesting, but yes if it is he is showing those kind of defensive bowling signs, which indeed cause Harbhajan to become stagnant - that's a bad sign.

 

[Biggs]

I just read someones comment on a CricInfo article calling for Wasim Akram to become India's bowling coach... so y'know... there's crazier people out there, not just here on PlanetCricket.

...not sure what you're bowling attack issues are though, you've got reasonably decent bowlers, they're just hugely overrated and not bowling as a unit. Like your middle-order, everyone just seems out for themselves, except for Dhoni and Kohli who know how to bat in a partnership. Cricket is all about cycles and India are going through a patch where you've got middle-to-good players making the team, that can't perform outside of home conditions. NZ had the same problem a couple of years ago, decent few overseas tours, especially in England fixed that (Bangladesh aside).

EDIT:

Your bowlers should be using players like Mills as a baseline for bowlers with limited ability making the most out of it, and a batsman like Kane Williamson who knows exactly what his role in the team is (ie, not to be a show-pony) and go from there.

 

[surendar]

I just read someones comment on a CricInfo article calling for Wasim Akram to become India's bowling coach... so y'know... there's crazier people out there, not just here on PlanetCricket.

Not only on cricinfo but also on facebook! PC forums has lot of genuine members with abilities of logical assessments/thought processing.

I have felt embarrassed many times. Most craziest facebook post which I came across in my news feed was from someone posting, 'India is not winning because Tendulkar retried, & they have won 0 games after retirement!' But again, there is nothing that is going to change and will change in near future from these crazy things.