I think these guys who won the worldcup need a longer run. Their confidence is up and they are full of energy. Best thing to enable likes of Rohit, Uthappa, Gambhir, RP Singh to play more games would be that BIG THREE retire from ODI.
This will solve many issues…
It will give these new guys fair chance to prove themselves and in that process we will build a team for worldcup 2011. My worry is that big three will retire when 1-2 year is left fo worldcup and we will not have enough times for others guys to fit in.
This will prolong Test career of Dravid, Sachin and Ganguly.
Once big THREE retire we will have guys with enough experience at International level ( although in ODIs) to transition into test team.
"build a team for WC 2011"........and I thought F&B you're a mature 30+ bloke.
Why cricket in south asia starts and ends at World Cups? Don't you like these young guns of India beat Aus in Aus, RSA in RSA and win Champions Trophy in England and have same home and away averages, more consistancy and less God like hype.
I think deceases are almost same on both sides of border.
"build a team for WC 2011"........and I thought F&B you're a mature 30+ bloke.
Why cricket in south asia starts and ends at World Cups? Don't you like these young guns of India beat Aus in Aus, RSA in RSA and win Champions Trophy in England and have same home and away averages, more consistancy and less God like hype.
I think deceases are almost same on both sides of border.
Mere Bhai...these guys wont be there till 2011. worldcup should always be goal and strategies should be defined around that.
After looking at performance of Indian team in last 2 ODIs and I am more convinced of my approach mentioned in this thread.. Its time for top Guns to go from ODIs. We are proud of what they have achieved and its time to say good bye. We are gonna lose anyway, Let this loss be used to invest in new guys. Let Rohit, Uthappa etc get play more at top order.
I agree. The presence of the big shots in the team de-motivates the youngsters and they start relying on others. Without Sachin and Dravid the young guns feel they are the only ones who can win it. Sachin MUST go.
Take anyone out, put anyone in...try all permutations and combinations but the result will be the same.....
I am 100% convinced that the problem with Indian Cricket is THE FRIGGIN INDIAN PUBLIC and the FRIGGIN INDIAN MEDIA.
They put the team on the PEDESTAL after one good performance, and beat them with CHAPPALS after one bad performance.
To perform on the field, the team needs to play WITHOUT FEAR AND PRESSURE. Twenty20 World Cup was a rare occasion when there was no pressure on the team....and see the way they performed.
Look at Australia, they may be 30/3...but they go about batting in their usual manner....not recede into a shell overcome with negativity like the Indian team does.
The INDIAN PUBLIC and MEDIA must learn to not get intoxicated by team's victories and at the same time not lose sanity in defeat. The ch*t*a public must learn to be objective at all times.....otherwise with such intense pressure of expectation - the team simply cannot perform fearlessly.
To quote Rabindranath Tagore :
Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high; Where knowledge is free; Where the world has not been broken up into fragments by narrow domestic walls; Where words come out from the depth of truth; Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection; Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way into the dreary desert sand of dead habit; Where the mind is led forward by Thee to ever-widening thought and action - Into that heaven of freedom, my father, let my country awake.
Well...ok.....not 100% relevant but I just had to get that in. Great Lines.
I don't agree that it is the pressure of the media and public causing Indian cricketers to perform badly. As a matter of fact they perform really well when the pressure is paramount, e.g when they play Pakistan in World Cups. So it is not the pressure but the lack of confidence. They see Symonds and Hayden and start peeing in their pants. They need to play like professionals no matter how much pressure from media and public. What a sissy attitude if they blame the public for their inept performances on the field. How unprofessional!
I don't agree that it is the pressure of the media and public causing Indian cricketers to perform badly. As a matter of fact they perform really well when the pressure is paramount, e.g when they play Pakistan in World Cups. So it is not the pressure but the lack of confidence. They see Symonds and Hayden and start peeing in their pants. They need to play like professionals no matter how much pressure from media and public. What a sissy attitude if they blame the public for their inept performances on the field. How unprofessional!
It is not a very simple cause and effect.
The whole system is designed to create a stressful team environment at various levels. For example, some players are more equal than others regardless of their performance. One game without Ganguly and the Bengali media goes in attack mode against the selection committee. While some new players are forever on trial.
I disagree that anybody "pees in their pants" when they see Hayden/Ponting etc. Far from it, this Indian team has been very pugnacious against the Aussies of late - which is a nice change from before.
It is just that the Indian team caters to the expectation of half a billion people...and therefore play their cricket with much less fun and much more fear than other teams.
I gave a match situation above. Consider that the score is 30/3. How Australia and India bat in this situation is proof of the difference in "fear factor" between the two teams. Indians will usually retreat into a total shell....and will end up not only making less runs but finally also losing more wickets. While Australia will continue to bat in normal fashion - 8 out 10 times it works out well for them.
As for the India-Pak matches...well, lets just say that Pak is under as much pressure in those matches...and I will also add that the Indians have also enjoyed a bit of luck recently in the crucial matches against Pak.
‘Nobody can take their place for granted’ - Vengsarkar Cricinfo staff October 6, 2007
Dilip Vengsarkar, India’s chairman of selectors, has sounded out a warning to the senior players following the team’s second consecutive defeat to Australia in the seven-match series.
Vengsarkar made it clear that the seniors needed to raise their game, especially in the wake of the World Twenty20 triumph engineered by a young side. “There are many players like S Badrinath and Suresh Raina who are performing with the India A side,” Vengsarkar told Mid-Day, a Mumbai-based tabloid. “These guys are waiting for their chance and you cannot ignore them. It’s a professional set-up and nobody can take their place for granted.”
India made one change for the fourth and fifth one-dayers, bringing in left-arm spinner Murali Kartik for offspinner Ramesh Powar. Powar bowled only 11 overs in the first two ODIs, failing to pick up any wickets and conceded 7.27 runs an over.
Vengsarkar justified the move. “If you get picked as a frontline bowler, then you have to bowl 10 overs. Plus, if your fielding is found wanting and you do not contribute with the bat, the team is obviously at a disadvantage. Ramesh has to get fitter and field better. He also has to improve his bowling.”
Vengsarkar also justified Kartik’s selection over promising Hyderabad left-arm spinner Pragyan Ojha. “Ojha is very young, just 21. It is not fair to unleash him against a side like Australia. We need to groom youngsters. Kartik is experienced and offers us better variation than two offspinners.”
“We are not a great fielding side anyway,” he said when asked for an assessment of the series so far. “Australia saved about 25 runs on the field. If we had fielded that way, the match would have been much closer.” http://content-usa.cricinfo.com/indvaus/content/current/story/313984.html
Good work Vengsarkar.Atleast you got this one right.