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India threw away a golden opportunity to register their first win of the series. It is high time that the excuses stopped. Yet another humiliating defeat at the hands of a very ordinary New Zealand at Napier - just goes to show the lack of planning and thinking in the Indian camp. The conditions were ideal for batting; no more devilish grass, prodigious seam movement or any uncertain bounce. The ball was coming on to the bat nicely, and add to it - the ground being small, a target of 255 should not have been an imposing one for this Indian team. Sehwag's brilliant hundred is a testimony to the condition of the pitch. It surely had eased out to be a nice batting track towards the latter part of the game. It is also true that the team tends to struggle when the captain is having a horrid time. Ganguly's failure, and that too in the absence of Tendulkar, is a definite cause of concern. It was a good move on his part to open the innings, but to have lasted only three balls does not necessarily infuse assurance. Having elected to field, the team should have supported the bowlers much better. Today's fielding performance can best be termed as abysmal. This is not a case of over-confidence but a clear lacking of a sensible strategy. They just went out and hoped for the best, while the Kiwis executed their trusted plan to good effect. The differences between the two teams are in the fielding department, and in running between the wickets. India gave away too many easy runs in the field - allowing Astle, Sinclair and Vincent to convert those singles to easy twos. As I had mentioned earlier, the ground in Napier is on the smaller side, and it becomes easy for the fielders to cut those twos and threes. Rahul Dravid should not be burdened with this wicket- keeping job anymore, going by today's performance, it is apparent that he is not the man for the job. It is time to bring in a specialist wicket-keeper/batsman in. How could one excuse the experienced Indian side for bowling their overs so slowly? Those dozen balls matters a lot in one-day cricket, and this is another indication of the slackness of the team management. It was a pathetic show by all means, when Sehwag should have gone on and finished the game for India; he gets run out to the last ball off Tuffey's spell! I can't make any sense out of the thinking, or the lack of the same, in the Indian camp. Surely this is not a good way to finish a very good year for Indian cricket, and that too making themselves look so stupid. © CricInfo |
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