INDIAN captain Mahendra Dhoni last night attempted to justify his team’s embarrassing nine-wicket mauling by Australia as a mere “practice match”, India fielded a Young team and were playing without their Big Four who performed so well in the tests their young players failed to match the intensity of the Aussies.
The match was played in front of a packed house the crowd was extremely disappointed when the T20 champ India was fired out for a paltry 74 in just 17.3 overs and 73 minutes.In reply, the Australians scorched to victory with 52 balls remaining to end a week of anger and frustration and claim the upper-hand in wake of Harbhajan Singh’s lucky escape for racial abuse.Harbhajan was widely heckled by spectators when he batted and bowled, and he was given a raspberry when he and Irfan Pathan collided while going for a catch to hand Michael Clarke a life.Australia was brilliantly led in the field and with the bat by Clarke, who was given the captaincy when Ricky Ponting failed a fitness test on his chronic back injury.Its been a demoralizing defeat for the Indian’s just a head of CB series, India might have to rethink their strategy of resting the big Four in the shorter version of the game as Yuvraj Singh and Dhoni are out of form and the relatively new recruits Uthappa, Gambhir, Karthik and Sharma failed to live up to the expectations if India has to fancy their chances in CB series they will have to play at least three out of the big four if they want to compete with Australia and Sri lanka.
The rain gods were on India’s side as the young and inexperienced Indian team who was on the verge of another defeat carried home 2 precious points because the match got abandoned.
Dhoni’s post match conference has made Team India’s objectives clear, India’s main objective is too rebuild its core for the 2011 WC and therefore they have rested their senior players and are recruiting the best from their domestic circuit in a hope to find the replacement for the Big three who are set to retire in a year’s time.Team India’s priority is too find new talent who can survive in hostile conditions in Australia against two of the best teams in the world its a smart ploy and if India are able to find two or three good players on this tour then it would be much more fruitful for them in the long run than winning the CB trophy. So far the results have been disappointing as none of the younsters showed any class especially in the batting department and if this is the likely composition of team India in future then I am afraid to say that India’s new found glory in test and other formats will be short lived they will also struggle like Pakistan and Windies for a long time in future.
None of the new batsmen have the class of Sachin,Dravid or Ganguly these guys have carried Indian team on their shoulders over the past 12 to 15 years it will be really hard for India to find their replacements just like Pakistan who are still struggling to find a proper pace attack in place of Wasim & Waqar
and openers like Saeed & Aamir.
Although it will be too harsh to judge these guys after one series but so far we have not seen any exceptional raw talent in batting.
Also Dhoni Should improvise if he has to fancy any chance of reaching the finals he might have to make some changes in the batting order and he must lead from the front and should not find rebuilding of the team as an excuse to loose the CB series.
Yes, Tiwary was given a great oppurtunity today. But it’s very surprising that he batted ahead of Uthappa and Dhoni.
India will have to sort out the batting order for the next match. Yuvi will come back from injury, so Rohit and Uthappa will bat lower down the order. I think Uthappa is being wasted in the lower middle order. There should be a definite role for him in the team, otherwise it’s better to play a genuine middle order batsman like Raina or all -rounders like P.Kumar or Chawla.
Dhoni should have come in to bat earlier or he should have sent Pathan in earlier to avoid the collapse, these young players do not have the class of Dravid, Ganguly and Laxman.
India again dropped Ganguly and Dravid and are paying the price and why this Tiwari guy was given preference over Yuvraj. Lee is demolishing India
It is imperitive that the Indians feild their best 11 against the Aussies in the CB series,after the racism scadal and the retirement of Gilly and Tait Australians look disintegrated,Indians should not let them regroup by feilding inexperienced and out of form players against the Aussies in the CB series.
Harbhajan was heckled again by the spectators when he was feilding in the 20/20 match and now this egg incident with Murali
happened, a defeat in the CB series will seriously damage the confidence of Aussie players, Indians and Srilankans should not get intimidated by such incidents and should play as hard as they can.
Either way, such incidents should have been avoided. Considering that Murali has been subjected to such attacks in the past, they should have been provided better security to the Sri Lankan team.
There was the whole Harbhajan episode, and now this…
The Aussies do appear to be an egg-alitarian society indeed!
Samy:
Yes it is confirmed, but luckily it was not Murali who got egged it was one of the team selectors who got hit by an egg on his back.The egg was thrown from a car when they were coming out of a hotel in Hobart.
Wasim,
I agree with your views, but I feel players like Ganguly and Dravid should have been picked only for the first few games to guide the youngsters, and not for the whole series. In the T20 game for instance, they should have replaced Yuvraj with Tendulkar, as having someone like Sachin at the other end would have eased the nerves of the young batsmen who were playing their first game in Aus. In later games when the players have adjusted to the conditions, it would be a better idea if they go with only youngsters.
By the way, TV news has reported that an Australian fan threw an egg on Muralitharan, at Hobart yesterday. Has this been confirmed?
Samy:
I can understand your view point to expose the youngsters to the invaluable experience of playing against Australia in Australia but it also has a downside, a lot of times youngsters cant handle the pressure due to lack of experience and often times in Subcontinent the careers of such players are finished after one such series.
IMO, India should play a mix of youth and experience,so that the senior players can guide the yougsters. In the recent India and Pakistan test series each time Jaffer scored big you must have noticed that whenever Shoaib Akhter came into bowl Dravid took care of him and didn’t exposed the youngster to Shoaib earlier on in his innings and as a result he played some big innings.
Yuvraj and Dhoni are out of form they will have to lift up their game.
I think India got overawed in the huge stadium. Most of the players are touring Aus for the first time and are not used to playing in grounds as big as the MCG. The wicket too was a bit slow and it would take time adjusting to the conditions. The catching also will have to improve.
This ODI team reminds me of the Indian team that toured in 1999-2000. Most of the players then too were touring Aus for the 1st time and India were similarly beaten by Aus and Pak.
In the current CB series, not having Dravid or Ganguly will affect India. It will take time for the young players to come to grips with the conditions, and when that happens India will be out of the tournament.
So I think everyone must expect such performances by India in the CB series. I hope the selectors don’t drop the youngsters and include seniors even if India don’t win a game in the series.