#IndvsAus: Spinners can’t win Dhoni matches abroad
Moments after India won the Test series against South Africa last month, cricket fans across the country started worshipping R Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja as India’s next set of match-winners. After all, while Ashwin had picked 31 wickets from four matches, Jadeja had picked 23.
So what happened to them in the space of a few weeks that they first gave away 129 runs in 18 overs between themselves in the first ODI in Australia, followed by 110 runs in 19 overs in the second ODI on Friday?
The answer is very simple. While the dust bowls and the close-in fielders helped their cause in the Test series against the hapless South African batsmen, the moment the wickets stopped assisting them — in Australia — the reality came to the fore.
While Ashwin is still undoubtedly one of the best spinners in the country, Jadeja is nothing more than a T20 specialist who can stop the flow of runs on a good day and manage to pick a wicket here and there.
It was indeed surprising to think skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni would say after the first ODI that he never expected his spinners to have an off day. Playing on the fast and bouncy wickets in Australia and expecting the spinners to win you matches in itself shows that the Indian team lacks ideas and quality in the shorter format of the game.
Also, to believe that your pacers will play second fiddle to your spin bowlers on wickets cut out for the faster bowlers shows how the Indian limited overs team lacks the depth and penetration in the fast bowling department.
On conditions available in Australia, the pace bowlers should be itching to bowl and make the spinners wait for their turn. But in the first two ODIs, that was far from the case.
The current situation reminds one of former England skipper Naseer Hussain’s assessment of the Indian team, which was thrashed in the Test series in England in the 2011 season. Praveen Kumar was the pick of the bowlers for India and kept picking wickets at will.
Even then, India lost each and every Test in the series and when asked the reason, Hussain beautifully explained how a 125kph bowler can never win you a Test match on foreign shores, even though he might be picking wickets at will.
Similarly, this Indian team can only become world beaters when the likes of Ishant Sharma, Umesh Yadav and Barinder Sran, among others, start taking more responsibility.
The best ODI teams in the world are those that have the bowling to thrive on every condition on offer and that was the very reason South Africa managed to win the recent ODI series against India.
While they didn’t have the best tweakers in the side, they had pacers like Morne Morkel, Dale Steyn and Kagiso Rabada who managed to outdo the Indian batsmen even on batting-friendly wickets. Also, Dhoni’s captaincy has left a lot to be desired in recent times.
Not just in the series against the Proteas, but even against Australia, he has failed to work overtime.
Playing the catching up game as the skipper on the field can be detrimental and that is exactly what has been displayed by the Indian team in recent times in the shorter formats of the game.
(Courtesy Mail Today.)