Sunday, November 14, 2004
Cricketing Woes
Few would have realized at the beginning of the year that Indian cricket would reach the low that it has now. Its a pity what the three month hiatus has done to the team after their admirable performance in Pakistan. I guess that its safe to say that Indian cricket is in the doldrums.
Before the match commenced yesterday, I had already predicted that Pakistan would emerge victorious. Although the Indians posted a biggish total, Pakistanis were the better team. What I have come to realize that the Indian team is just not balanced. I mean,what happens if one of the bowlers were to have a bad day. There is just no back up bowler to do the job. Similarly, lack of a specialist keeper is also proving costly. I guess there were far too many runs scored because Dravid could not collect keenly on the leg side. Going in with seven specialist batsmen is almost as if there is no faith in the six batsmen doing the job.What we need to look for a specialist keeper who is quite capable with the bat too. Maybe looking for a Gilchrist is a bit too much but atleast he must be able to do what Moin does for Pakistan or Boucher does so consistently for SA. Also there are just no quality all rounders in the squad. Irfan hasnt done particularly much with the bat and Agarkar lacks consistency. With the kind of team India fields in the ODIs, its adding a bit too much pressure on the specialist bowlers. In the long run, the Indian ODI outfit needs to be changed before things get out of hand.
Before the match commenced yesterday, I had already predicted that Pakistan would emerge victorious. Although the Indians posted a biggish total, Pakistanis were the better team. What I have come to realize that the Indian team is just not balanced. I mean,what happens if one of the bowlers were to have a bad day. There is just no back up bowler to do the job. Similarly, lack of a specialist keeper is also proving costly. I guess there were far too many runs scored because Dravid could not collect keenly on the leg side. Going in with seven specialist batsmen is almost as if there is no faith in the six batsmen doing the job.What we need to look for a specialist keeper who is quite capable with the bat too. Maybe looking for a Gilchrist is a bit too much but atleast he must be able to do what Moin does for Pakistan or Boucher does so consistently for SA. Also there are just no quality all rounders in the squad. Irfan hasnt done particularly much with the bat and Agarkar lacks consistency. With the kind of team India fields in the ODIs, its adding a bit too much pressure on the specialist bowlers. In the long run, the Indian ODI outfit needs to be changed before things get out of hand.
# posted by Praveen @ 11:15 AM 
