Bazza,
Yeh u r partially right about form and confidence. But when the entire team starts underachieving, especially the kind of stellar ODI records they have, it cannot be that everyone is out of form. Gangulay is out of form. But the rest of them just do not have confidence. WI team has gone thru this phase.
But one thing that changes this is if there is one fighting innings from someone.
That's right. That's my take too. We had seven batsmen in form through the last year, and today all seven have suddenly forgotten how to play?
As for the attitude and confidence, Sachin and Saurav are not wanting there.
All this talk about the batting positions, and Saurav's captaincy affecting his batting etc. is crap.
That observation about Sachin that he doesnt come through when needed is ridiculous too. He has done that match after match throughout his career. Even in this match, he was hardly cowed. All he needed was someone at the other end to just give the strike back to him. Lara bailed his team out of trouble in the first match. He did it with the help of Chanderpaul who gamely stuck in the other end, handed it back to Lara regularly, and even struck Donald to the fence a few times.
In this match what happened was that whenever Sachin got the strike, he took a single, and expected the other guy to hand it back to him. I am sure that was what he told every batsman that came in too- just take singles, lets put up a partnership. Unfortunately noone else was in the mood. I think that even after 25 overs or so Sachin had a strike rate over 70 but had scored only about 30 runs! That tells you how the others failed to give it back to him.
The key to me was Rahul Dravid's innings and his exit. He could have bailed us out in the company of SRT.
Two good innings will turn everything around. Saurav and Rahul Dravid must come to the fore.
My take on the batsmen:
Sachin Tendulkar: no problems here. Infact he's in great touch and remains our biggest strength.
Saurav Ganguly: he's not scared. He got the right idea to start with but he seems to be out of form. In his case, it's NOT the captaincy, or anything like that, but he doesnt seem to be trying to correct his problems at the crease. While Saurav was correct in trying to go after the opening bowlers, what was wrong was that he seemed to play premeditated shots. It was clear that he'd decided before the bowler took the ball in his hand that he's going to try to belt the ball over the covers or to play the cut. That's not the usual Saurav Ganguly. When he's playing his shots now, there is no weight into the shot. The commentator (I think Sanjay Manjrekar- he sucks) said that Ganguly didnt go 'hard enough' at the ball. Rather, he regularly tried to go too hard from the crease. When this guy is in full flow, he's playing his shots naturally and with great timing. He gets his foot well in front and invariably gets the ball to go off the middle of his bat. When playing backfoot shots, again he relies on his timing, and gracefully transfers weight to the backfoot. Today there was none of that in evidence except for a couple of legside shots. He was all arms, that's it. I dont think he's too far from a good knock.. but he needs to look at some of his earlier videos and compare how he's playing the same shots today.
Rahul Dravid: The key to the Indian performance. One can always rely on Sachin to come good no matter what. Rahul Dravid's all round game has been the difference between good Indian performances and insipid shows like today. As an Indian fan, I'm certainly not happy that this guy is proving so mentally fragile. He's a quality bat and has to believe that. He simply couldn't drop the ball between the fielders and steal singles today. Close watchers of the Indian team will know that that is a sure sign of this guy being intimidated. We've seen this earlier. This is in stark contrast to the way he's played throughout the year. Again, people who've watched these guys for years will know that when Rahul is in form he actually scores faster than Saurav. He is at his best when he's playing his strokes. Watching him play now, it looks like he doesnt think he can do that anymore!
Yet again, these three batsmen are the guys who need to lead the way. While Saurav needs to reorganize his game and do two things: get rid of this habit of playing premeditated shots, and to commit himself to his shots once he's going for it; Rahul needs to start believing in himself again.
Yuvaraj, Kaif and Sehwag will be back. When they started out, they had the big three and Laxman in form. These guys are all short of confidence right now and need to hit their way out of it- something they can do only if the seniors click again. These three have good allround game, attitude and certainly belong at the big stage.
Re: Laxman
Laxman is a class batsman. He's terrific because not only does he have a tremendous (and unique) game but his game doesnt seem to be affected by anything happening around him. I agree that in a situation like this he's usefull for that one reason- a low score on the board with plenty of wickets going down probably wont affect his game.
But, in my book, he still doesnt win a place in this team on strength of his recent ODI performances. One player who should have been there is Hemang Badani.
Guys, India lost the match to the best team in the world, and its just one match. But all of a sudden you guys (Indian supporters) have lost all faith in them, it will be funny if they can make it to the super six, which is still a distinct possibility and then your attitude will change overnight.
huh?
Who lost faith in the team?
I'm getting the feeling that the only occupation of a good many of the members in this board is to analyse 'Indian supporters', 'Indian fans', 'terrace elements', and to point out how some people aren't 'true supporters' and whatnot :rolleyes:
Everyone knows that qualifying to the supersix is a distinct possibility. But given the attitude with which they are playing, they will probably go into every single match with apprehension rather than confidence whether it is Zimbabwe, or Pakistan. And that can't be good. What's wrong with slamming the team when they aren't up to the mark? That doesnt mean that we're not going to root for them nor does it mean that we're writing them off!
This team has over the past year or two been good enough to give the Australians a tough fight. I think most of the Indian fans here have seen enough to know that India definitely has it in them to win the WC. We are all hoping that these guys play like they can and have been doing for quite a while. Frankly I didnt think they'd let that farce of a tour in NZ bother them all that much but clearly I was wrong.
