One more game, in Nottingham on Tuesday, and the Indian cricket team – not to mention a massive media entourage – will be heading home. By the time new champions are crowned at Lord’s next Sunday, the erstwhile champions will be back home, wondering just how they made such a pig’s ear of the title defence. Sloppy in the defeat to West Indies on Friday, they were too clever for their own good on Sunday, messing up a run chase in the face of sustained short-pitched bowling from a disciplined English attack. That they got so close in the end merely highlighted the failure of their tactics, and opened up a whole new can of what-ifs.
Yusuf Pathan scored off every ball he faced to finish with 33 from 17 balls, while MS Dhoni ended the game unbeaten on 30 from 20 balls. By the time Yusuf came to the crease though, 67 were needed from six overs. Yuvraj Singh had faced a similar situation, walking out with 92 required from 57 balls. Why had it come to that? With Yuvraj in such prime form, was there really a need to send Ravindra Jadeja up the order, especially when the 20-year-old had played just one ODI and two T20 games for India? In a crunch game, why would you back a new boy over an old hand?
As it was, Jadeja struggled horribly, barely middling a ball in an innings of 25 from 35 balls that sent the asking-rate soaring. Gautam Gambhir too was far from fluent, cramped for room by balls directed at the body and eventually forced into a half-hearted paddle that went straight to short fine leg. Yuvraj slammed the first ball he faced for six, and then hit one more, but James Foster’s dazzling glovework ended any thoughts of a Durban-like six barrage.
India’s bowling had been similarly ineffectual until the spinners came on. Kevin Pietersen batted with real majesty for his 46 and with Ravi Bopara rotating the strike, a massive total appeared to be on the cards. But Jadeja’s quicker deliveries and accuracy stemmed the tide, while Harbhajan chipped in with more wickets at the end. What proved costly though were the extras, 16 of them, including two attempted yorkers from Harbhajan that only took the leg-side route to the rope past Dhoni’s gloves.
On such slipshod moments are games won and lost. Later, Dhoni called the decision to promote Jadeja a gamble that failed to pay off. But why gamble at all when you have the most destructive batsman in the side pencilled in at No.4? The history of sport is littered with examples of teams that tried to over-complicate the game and fell short. You can add India to that list now. Clever is good, too clever is not. And while England march on to a winner-take-all contest against West Indies, India can pack their bags. Champions no more.
One more game, in Nottingham on Tuesday, and the Indian cricket team – not to mention a massive media entourage – will be heading home. By the time new champions are crowned at Lord’s next Sunday, the erstwhile champions will be back home, wondering just how they made such a pig’s ear of the title defence. Sloppy in the defeat to West Indies on Friday, they were too clever for their own good on Sunday, messing up a run chase in the face of sustained short-pitched bowling from a disciplined English attack. That they got so close in the end merely highlighted the failure of their tactics, and opened up a whole new can of what-ifs.
Yusuf Pathan scored off every ball he faced to finish with 33 from 17 balls, while MS Dhoni ended the game unbeaten on 30 from 20 balls. By the time Yusuf came to the crease though, 67 were needed from six overs. Yuvraj Singh had faced a similar situation, walking out with 92 required from 57 balls. Why had it come to that? With Yuvraj in such prime form, was there really a need to send Ravindra Jadeja up the order, especially when the 20-year-old had played just one ODI and two T20 games for India? In a crunch game, why would you back a new boy over an old hand?
As it was, Jadeja struggled horribly, barely middling a ball in an innings of 25 from 35 balls that sent the asking-rate soaring. Gautam Gambhir too was far from fluent, cramped for room by balls directed at the body and eventually forced into a half-hearted paddle that went straight to short fine leg. Yuvraj slammed the first ball he faced for six, and then hit one more, but James Foster’s dazzling glovework ended any thoughts of a Durban-like six barrage.
India’s bowling had been similarly ineffectual until the spinners came on. Kevin Pietersen batted with real majesty for his 46 and with Ravi Bopara rotating the strike, a massive total appeared to be on the cards. But Jadeja’s quicker deliveries and accuracy stemmed the tide, while Harbhajan chipped in with more wickets at the end. What proved costly though were the extras, 16 of them, including two attempted yorkers from Harbhajan that only took the leg-side route to the rope past Dhoni’s gloves.
On such slipshod moments are games won and lost. Later, Dhoni called the decision to promote Jadeja a gamble that failed to pay off. But why gamble at all when you have the most destructive batsman in the side pencilled in at No.4? The history of sport is littered with examples of teams that tried to over-complicate the game and fell short. You can add India to that list now. Clever is good, too clever is not. And while England march on to a winner-take-all contest against West Indies, India can pack their bags. Champions no more.
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Jadeja’s promotion just keeps getting more puzzling, there is no way Yuvraj should face less than 30 balls in a T20 when he’s in that kind of form. And why send up another left hander if you’re going to change the order, Raina was horrible against the short stuff in the last match, Dhoni has traditionally been good against it what with unorthodox helicopter smashes. I mean if he tried twice against the minnows, why hold out now rather than expose one of your in-form batsman to bowling he definitely wasn’t comfortable based on prior evidence.
Why bat Yuvraj at 4? Why not send him in at 3 to attack Broad?
What I meant, Richard, was that he should at least have been batting at No.4. No lower.
Good summary. Though I fear poor Jadeja’s going to face the brunt of the fan’s ire, rather than the think-tank. Colossal cock-up there.
I hope not, it wasn’t his fault he was sent in to do a job he wasn’t suited for. His bowling did, after all, help keep India in the game in the first place
There were so many blunders committed, it’s hard to think if they were trying to be clever or just too muddled up to think straight.
In other blogs, the point has been raised as to why Ishant bowled four overs and RP bowled only three. Plus, Ishant is so down in pace, what gives with him ? Is he already starting to burn out ?
Then the wides, Yuvraj’s mis field, the batting order.. Taking things into one picture – seems more a case of a muddled up team who didn’t know how to play the percentages right.
One galling thing though was listening to Nasser Hussain – gloat during the match, and then diss the IPL after it.
I can’t wait for the Ashes and the Aussies to shut his mouth
It was clear that both losses were because the top order had no clue of how to go about about attacking the short pitched delivery. It is okay to fail once, but it is important to learn the lesson, practice hard, become better players and come up with the goods next time around. That is what differentiates the men from the boys and if they fail to adapt, it would probably differentiate Rohit Sharma and Suresh Raina from Sachin Tendulkar and Rahul Dravid.
In a way, I wouldn’t mind India losing this. If this big a loss can drill a lesson into the heads of Rainas and Rohits that you can’t just be flat track bullies, then it can only be good for India. After all th accolades that came their way during the IPL, this was the perfect wakeup call for them.
India wouldn’t have reached semis anyway, even if they had beaten England! SA is is in red hot form and I doubt if India would have defeated them. India were very off colour since the beginning and defeating 2 minnows counts for nothing. I’m glad that the fatigued players would be coming back early. At least they know their weaknesses and will get time to work on that!
Great Article Dileep, and great comments here folks.
It was just nightmarish to watch the “game” unfold yesterday. The tactical blunders apart, it just looked like England had a plan and they “wanted” the win much more.
Dhoni and his men owe us answers to these questions?
• Why did Dhoni choose to field?
• Why Irfan was left out instead of Ishant?
• Why did Dhoni bowl Yuvraj?
• Why RP Singh and Zaheer didn’t bowl their 4 overs?
• Why was Jadeja sent ahead of Yuvraj?
Couldn’t agree more, the decision to play Jadeja at 4 was a big mistake, the kid just isn’t good enough at the moment to be playing at this level. What worried me more though was Raina. I’ve heard so much about him and what little I have seen of him prior to this tournament was encouraging. However his performance against the Windies and England was embarrassing to say the least. Think Hussain summed it up quite well; “Say whatever you want, the pressure of being favourites, or whatever, you can’t deny that this Indian team is found technically wanting” How painful is that for a team that has produced some batting greats of recent years. Just goes to show that India shouldn’t get rid of the older guard in the tests just as yet! Think the Rainas and Sharmas and Kohlis need a few more A tours to Australia, SA and England and need to get the bowling machine bowling at their necks!
The list of errors is pretty long. While Jadeja will probably take the brunt of it (and his innings was incredibly frustrating), Gambhir wasn’t as effective as he could have been either – all through the tournament. Had Harbhajan not given away some avoidable wides, the result would have also been different. England’s tactics were dull, but fair play to them, they went for the win.
Yuvraj, Pathan and Dhoni had too much to do in the end.
Sport has to have winners and losers, though and this tournament has been good for the fact that we have had upsets. I don’t like the whispers already being made to “ensure the test nations make it to the super 8s next time.”
Ireland and the Netherlands in particular have done more than make up the numbers. If they’re in a competition to compete, it would be a travesty to keep them out.
I’m hoping SA or SL go on and win it now. And also that Pakistan get to the semis at least. It would be nice if there was one tournament where the Pakistan team weren’t dragged into a controversy, though!
dileep, yes, India cocked it up but your biggest argument about the batting order seems to be a case of wisdom earned in hindsight. I don’t believe dhoni imagined that jadeja would bat for 35 balls scoring only 25. Given he was the extra batsman, Dhoni reckoned he’s either get out for zero or score a quick 15-20 off 8-9 deliveries to give some impetus to the innings.
If the order had been yuvraj-dhoni-yusuf-jadeja and india had fallen short by the same margin the question would be why put so much pressure on the youngster in his first match? i think its accepted that dhoni is known to try punts of this nature right from when he became captain (e.g. yusuf opening the batting in the finals in 2007). Only difference is that this is the first time one such move backfired.
The difference here is that Yuvraj is probably the most feared No.4 in the limited-overs game. The English bowlers have never done well against him. So the whole idea of protecting him was a bit silly.
Dileep, ever since the tournament started, one could feel Dhoni’s obstinacy building up, right from being adamant to come in at number 3 to his tiff with media over the Sehwag issue.
He was never willing to give in whatever the world around him thought and that finally led to the team’s ouster. In true sense, now is the litmus test of Dhoni’s character.
I’m not sure Dhoni’s ‘attack’ on the media is a bad thing – they were writing rubbish and didn’t deserve any respect.
Great captains are obstinate. If he captained by committee, we would be nowhere.
Mistakes were made, but that’s easy to say with hindsight. India didn’t lose by a large margin and although a win was increasingly unlikley, it still went into the final over.
I think the biggest loss was Sehwag. India just didn’t get the runs going early enough without him and as much as I admire Gambhir, his form was off for this tournament. Staying in with a low run-rate doesn’t help the team.
I think the players need a break. Dhoni has been on the road for ages, looks tired and perhaps that has had an impact on his captaincy and thinking. Since NZ tour, IPL and this he hasn’t had a break. Maybe its time the administrators gave these players a break……what is the point of having 4 ODIs with the Windies now?!