Indian test cricket from depths of despair to Bright sunshine from Dhoni to Virat the journey , compare

[philcric]

I feel we have to stop bringing Dhoni into the match threads and threads discussing other players. He has retired from test cricket and it's time for us to move on. Because Dhoni has achieved some awesome highs and ridiculous lows, people subconsciously fall into being either fanboys or haters. The truth is Dhoni was neither as great as the fanboys think nor as pathetic as the haters think. 

 

Constant Dhoni bashing doesn't serve any purpose anymore, it will alienate people who like Dhoni and in a perverse way they may want Kohli (and India) to fail. I can already see signs of it in the match thread.

 

IMO, Kohli has a great appetite to build a team, and he made a really good start. For a team in transition and some obvious gaps, it's progressing quite well. It's time to back him in full force, without comparing him to Dhoni. Dhoni got an unconditional backing from everyone when he became the captain in 2007-08. Kohli too deserves the same.

 

[MCcricket]

Dhoni n Virat are like chalk and cheese, Dhoni one who could be India's best Ltd overs batter n finisher n plus a decent captain in odi, especially in the subcontinent was the worse test captain to my knowledge , his flaws were so g!wrong n his ego did not allow him to let his team do better

He could never plan or envision like Virat has a plan and can see a future path for playing n how the team will play test cricket

Dhoni knew only one way to play, strangle the opposition on a slow track or a low ,uneven one n use accurate finger spinners n. Set defensive fields , he never learnt how to use his pace bowlers n how he could not use the same strategy to win abroad as you cannot use spinners to strangle opposition in Australis,S A n England it's elementary but he could not figure this out in a decade.

 

Secondly he never understood or valued what a strike Bowler is n why a team needs one n how he can be a game changer, he would turn any Bowler n want him to bowl like a stock bowler n be miserly , this he never valued bowlers who could potentially pick up wkts for him at a lower S/R.

 

He never changed his team or squad much n never gave enough guys a chance n actively looked to build a team for all conditions, he could not bat to save his life on a decent sporting wkt , n looked like a deer caught in a headlight, him not giving enough bowling too Ashwin n Umesh n his love for Jadeja is well known .

 

Him never taking the responsibility n insulting and degrading his team mates n constant!Y blaming the bowlers for his own failures n planning n sometimes batters fault.

[jusarrived]

51 minutes ago, New guy said:

 

The irony! Am I the only one who can see it? Surely not!

Only you ! infact was expecting you to say something like that when I posted . 

[beetle]

The best thing anti Dhoni guys can do for Virat is not over hype and constantly compare him.

Let him be a captain for three years at least .

 

[Ankit_sharma03]

8 hours ago, MCcricket said:

We see a stark difference in the effort, intent , team selection, results , under Dhoni n Virat.What if Dhoni was the Capt, he would've chosen Jadeja over Mishra n no Umesh in the lineup also probably no Pujara , bowler would have been given defensive fields, one slip max, asked to keep it tight n not just going for wkts, after 9 overs Jadeja would've bowled in the first innings, we would've scored about 350 owing to weak team selection n Ashwin would've batted around 8 and would not be Able to contribute much.

We would've never enforced a follow on as per capt Dhoni bowlers are tired n we just have 4 bowlers n our medium pacers are in effective as we don't have a pool , results R not I!porting but process is, lol.

I cannot over emphasize how bad a test captain Dhoni was, the worse I have seen personally , n please we R talking about test cricket so P!ease don't bring in World cup win as if he single handedly won it, Dhoni should have been kicked out as captain 3 years back, n Saha has contributed more then what Dhoni would have in terms of batting n keeping both

Yes dhoni wasnt a gud test captain but i disagree with most points. Dhoni would have gone with pujara for sure. Infact He didnt persist much with dhawan, dhawan was dropped in eng . Yes jadeja n bhuvi might have played over umesh n mishra but i dnt see a diff in the result. Dhoni himself in batting would have done better than saha n we might have had big score.

 

 

[zep1706]

I consider Dhoni to be the worst test captain I have seen in my life and I am not a Dhoni hater. It is also not about results. I think he's a great limited overs player and a very good captain too. But I like to call a spade a spade and he was a disgrace to the test format. So anyone other than him is an improvement. It was clear that Dhoni did not really value test cricket and he treated it as 5 days of one day cricket with his unconventional ridiculous approach. He was stubborn as a rock and played mostly not to lose, especially when it wasn't on a dustbowl. He was arrogant and was protected by his evil godfather. Kohli may not be a tactical genius and he is definitely going to have tough times in places like England and Australia but he plays to win, ready to change things and he likes the format. That alone makes me want to support him. 

Edited July 25, 2016 by zep1706

[velu]

you simply cant be a worst test captain and whitewash aussies ( 4 - 0 ) ..

wrist slitting shld stop 

[philcric]

4 minutes ago, velu said:

you simply cant be a worst test captain and whitewash aussies ( 4 - 0 ) ..

Nothing to do with Dhoni or anybody else, but the above statement is objectively flawed.

 

It IS possible that the above can happen.

 

It IS possible that India could have defeated Aussies 4-0 and Saffers 4-0 with Amit Mishra or Ishant Sharma as captain instead of Dhoni/Kohli. Because Aussies/Saffers were way way below par. When the opposition performs abysmally, it IS possible that the captaincy doesn't even come into the picture. Most of the stuff CAN happen in an almost auto-pilot mode, without any requirement of strategy, selection or planning. Similarly, Aus could have defeated Ind 3-0 in 1999 with Colin Miller as captain, Steven Waugh was not required. It IS possible India could win the current series against WI with Md. Shami as the captain.

 

PS: I don't believe Dhoni was the 'worst' test captain. IMO, he was a good ODI captain and an average test captain.

 

 

 

[velu]

1 minute ago, Viper said:

But but when our lugends were there mainly sachin paa jee we won all 4 tests in england and 4 tests in aus..  we brutally  whitewashed them  after 2011 wc in away matches..

dhonis record as a test captain is completely tainted by these seniors .. they overstayed and overplayed

interestingly dhoni is the second highest scorer in england in that 4-0 series

[philcric]

38 minutes ago, velu said:

you simply cant be a worst test captain and whitewash aussies ( 4 - 0 ) ..

Just for the Dhoni fanboys ...

 

As a corollary to the above, "you simply cant be a great test captain and get whitewashed against aussies ( 4 - 0 ) and english ( 4 - 0 ) .."

 

Sorry, couldn't resist  

 

[velu]

Just now, philcric said:

Just for the Dhoni fanboys ...

 

As a corollary to the above, "you simply cant be a great test captain and get whitewashed against aussies ( 4 - 0 ) and english ( 4 - 0 ) .."

 

Sorry, couldn't resist  

 

we are against the blind haterz who say dhoni is responsible  for the whitewash , but their gods are not

[zep1706]

44 minutes ago, velu said:

you simply cant be a worst test captain and whitewash aussies ( 4 - 0 ) ..

wrist slitting shld stop 

Ponting won 16 test matches in a row, 2 world cups and and a a shit load of other things. I still consider him as the worst Australian captain I have seen. For some of us, who follow the game closely it is not always about results. 

[velu]

1 minute ago, zep1706 said:

Ponting won 16 test matches in a row, 2 world cups and and a a shit load of other things. I still consider him as the worst Australian captain I have seen. For some of us, who follow the game closely it is not always about results. 

then why blame msd for the process ?

[zep1706]

12 minutes ago, Viper said:

But but when our lugends were there mainly sachin paa jee we won all 4 tests in england and 4 tests in aus..  we brutally  whitewashed them  after 2011 wc in away matches..

It's funny how you guys always ascribe motive to people who criticize Dhoni. Just to be clear, I am not a Sachin fan taking a shot at Dhoni. I have praised Dhoni and criticized Tendulkar many times in the past. I call it as I see it and yes Tendulkar wan't a good captain either. It was not his cup of tea and he realized it and relinquished it. 

[philcric]

4 minutes ago, velu said:

we are against the blind haterz who say dhoni is responsible  for the whitewash , but their gods are not

The thing is it works both ways. They may feel you guys are blind loverz who credit their hero with the world cup wins but wash their hands off of humiliating losses.

 

[urbestfriend]

One difference Kohli is doing is playing with 5 bowlers in every test match and this is going to make huge difference in the result. An odd results may go against us due to 7th batsman not there, but this is much better from winning perspective than playing 4 bowlers.  I am sure Anil Kumble will also support playing 5 bowler theory and it is going to work for us.

[zep1706]

1 minute ago, urbestfriend said:

One difference Kohli is doing is playing with 5 bowlers in every test match and this is going to make huge difference in the result. An odd results may go against us due to 7th batsman not there, but this is much better from winning perspective than playing 4 bowlers.  I am sure Anil Kumble will also support playing 5 bowler theory and it is going to work for us.

I don't want to boast but I was making that case here for 2-3 years when we were getting hammered overseas series after series. But the captain was too stubborn to try new things. The 5 bowler strategy may not work always but it is better than trying nothing different and expecting different results. 

[velu]

12 minutes ago, zep1706 said:

I don't want to boast but I was making that case here for 2-3 years when we were getting hammered overseas series after series. But the captain was too stubborn to try new things. The 5 bowler strategy may not work always but it is better than trying nothing different and expecting different results. 

when almost all of your fabulous batsmen were not scoring , it was not easy to pick 5 bowlers

 

[New guy]

1 hour ago, Viper said:

But but when our lugends were there mainly sachin paa jee we won all 4 tests in england and 4 tests in aus..  we brutally  whitewashed them  after 2011 wc in away matches..

Actually we did win the only test series in England with those legends present. And you are being the same hypocrites whom you are complaining about. If you can abuse and put down legends who have served Indian cricket for years because they fell out of form, then so can people do with Dhoni

 

The absolute hypocrisy of Dhoni fans constantly baiting the supporters of the old guard but immediately being defensive as soon as the same treatment is meted to Dhoni after he lost form is amusing. Your one sentence here shows how much the fans of other legends have suffered on this forum when Dhoni was on top for a long time. Now that they have gone and its Dhoni's turn suddenly it is not so pleasant for you

Edited July 25, 2016 by New guy

[New guy]

33 minutes ago, velu said:

when almost all of your fabulous batsmen were not scoring , it was not easy to pick 5 bowlers

 

Amazing Dhoni fan logic. Constantly target legends who have given years to Indian cricket because they failed in their last days. Constantly cry and whinge when the same treatment is meted out to Dhoni when he lost form as a player and captain