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Can this Indian test team surpass our 2007-10 team?


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How many times India have gotten a win/draw streak like we had recently until we lost the first test?

 

This team is special just like some previous teams but it has already done better.

 

We are never going to have the 0-8 result like we had before. The bowlers are doing great, batsmen have learned from their experiences and the team overall knows that there are some good players waiting to replace them if they don't perform consistently, so that has only made our players perform better. Our most players have had runs now overseas if not all or have scored enough in India to at least be shown confidence to give them chance overseas.

 

This is a special team which is of to greatness.

 

All India need is support from selectors now to back these same players and that to not make any drastic and silly changes like how some members think amd suggest here like dropping players like Rahane etc. 

 

 

 

 

 

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1 hour ago, laaloo said:

We have always been good at home but when have we been this good? We're whitewashing teams at home like no business. 3-0 against NZ. 2-0 against SA. Should have been 3-0 but because of weather. 4-0 against Eng. Now tied with Aus at 1-1.

We were pretty good in 90s as well but the litmus test will be when we tour away. Really want us to be more competitive away and if we are able to win at either Aus or SA that would be a cherry on the top.

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Well it depends on individuals who have to find answers to their issues

 

Vijay n Rahul- Fitness n consistency 

Pujara- question mark on overseas perfomances

kohli- opp will have better plans for kohli the batsman. Kohli the captain wud have minimize his blunders as he wont be in home conditions and he ll get few chances then at home

Rahane- consistency 

Nair- yet to be tested overseas

Saha -  His batting is a concern, ill be worried about him against quality bowlers overseas

Ashwin- Fitness + his bowling overseas

Shami - fitness and only fitness

Ishant- consistency and the art of taking wkts

Umesh- Temprament, consistency and finding reverse with old kookabura

Bhuvi - Would only consider him in condition where there is swing

  • 5th fast bowler- Aaron, thakur, aniket, nathu, rajpoot ....will have to figure out soon
  • 2nd spinner- Jadeja, mishra, jayant, kuldeep (my pick wud be kuldeep but we havent even tried him)
  • Backup opener- Parthiv  n who else??????
  • Need 1-2 Backup-batsman - In case of injury or Loss of form                                                                                                     What are our options- Iyer, Rohit :facepalm:, Manish Pandey , Bawane 
  • All rounders- Pandya n shankar yet to be tested ( but still looks an area where we are in better position )
  1. Hardik pandya- His bowling is better
  2. Shankar- his batting is beter
  3. Jayant- in case we need spin bowling all rounder      

 

 

Role of Selectors , kumble n Dravid becomes really important here. 

1. Right fast bowlers shud be picked......enough of giving berths to trundlers on A-tours

2. Make sure Pujara, Ishant n if fulfilled the criteria mukund also do go to play county cricket this year. 

3. Post IPL - Aaron, Saha, Parthiv, Vijay Nair, Jayant , Rahane (if not picked for CT) should also try to play the remained for county schedule. 

4. Make sure Kuldeep, pant n kishen are given max A- games as we need to find answers in the 2 areas where we dont have many options specially who are match winners. Dravid shud make Sure Pant keeps wkts through out DD season. 

Edited by Ankit_sharma03
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3 hours ago, Ankit_sharma03 said:

 

 

Saha -  His batting is a concern, ill be worried about him against quality bowlers overseas

Good list and regarding Saha, I would like to see him till the end of this series and may be Sri Lankan series.

 

It is really important that we do not just jump to Pant and all and forget Naman Ojha's contribution to India A's success overseas. He has been brilliant for us for India A and deserves to play ahead of Pant and co, who might not be ready yet.

 

If Saha is booted out with poor performance, I will call Naman Ojha. I trust him to perform too in South Africa in january. The guy can play big innings as he has shown with his performances for India A. He kept also well when given chance.

 

 

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6 hours ago, laaloo said:

We have always been good at home but when have we been this good? We're whitewashing teams at home like no business. 3-0 against NZ. 2-0 against SA. Should have been 3-0 but because of weather. 4-0 against Eng. Now tied with Aus at 1-1.

3-0 against RSA, should have been 4-0. You're right, we have never been this ruthless. Also if not for no DRS and bad luck we would have whitewashed both Lanka and WI away !!!

Edited by Gollum
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The one thing we are desperately missing in this team is presence of left handers. When you have so many right handers packed in your batting line up you get predictable and easier to work out if some opposition bowler catches a hot streak or there is rough present on one side of a wicket. We need left-right combo to become an ATG team. That Indian team had peak Gambhir opening and resurgent Dada in the middle order. Even among bowlers we had Zak who would create rough for Bhajji. Here we have Jaddu, who is a mediocre batsman and being a spinner can't create much rough. 

 

ATG Aus and WI teams didn't have leftie bowlers but sure as hell did they have some terrific leftie batsmen. Aus had Hayden, Langer, Hussey/Lehmann, Gilly, Katich while WI had the likes of Fredericks, Gomes, Lloyd, Arthurton, Jimmy Adams, Lara etc.

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38 minutes ago, Prince_ said:

Don't want to comes across as a bitter individual but what has this Indian team actually achieved?? 

 

I mean India has always been a top team at home and we have thrashed non Asian teams every time we played against them in the past. So, beating non Asian team at home hardly means anything. 

 

 

As far as this current Indian team is concerned, the only series i can remember where they performed somewhat decently was againist West indies. Then again they r a minnow tean and still we weren't able to whitewash them. :thinking:

This team also defeated Sri Lanka at their home, you know the same Lanka which trashed this Aussie team 3-0 and also defeated us when the Fab Four were playing. 

 

Also I don't know why winning/dominating at home is considered such a bad thing here. Literally every team apart from the Saffers are dominant at home and crap away.

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7 minutes ago, Prince_ said:

Well, having the ability to win consistently  at home is good, really good. But the fact is if a team want to claim themselves as the best team in the world then they'll have to do much more than that. 

 

I m glad that u've mentioned srilanka in ur post. Look at their performance against Australia on doctored pitches of Sri Lanka and look at their performance in Southafrica. 

 

Can u believe that a team that whitewashed Australia at home failed to even compete in Southafrica? I m not saying that they should've won, at least some sort of fight was expected from them. 

 

 

But they failed spectacularly there. This just proves that how badly aussies perform on doctored pitches against spin which is why I m saying that winning against them doesn't mean that much. 

I'm sorry but you're clutching at straws here. So according to you home victories against non-asian teams and away victories against SL and Windies don't mean that much at all? I think you should do yourself a favor and then stop watching the current series then. No point in watching in something which doesn't even mean much. Ridiculous post.

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3 hours ago, Cricketics said:

Good list and regarding Saha, I would like to see him till the end of this series and may be Sri Lankan series.

 

It is really important that we do not just jump to Pant and all and forget Naman Ojha's contribution to India A's success overseas. He has been brilliant for us for India A and deserves to play ahead of Pant and co, who might not be ready yet.

 

If Saha is booted out with poor performance, I will call Naman Ojha. I trust him to perform too in South Africa in january. The guy can play big innings as he has shown with his performances for India A. He kept also well when given chance.

 

 

Naman ojha hasnt been in good form since a while,i dnt see him coming back without a good domestic season for which he has to wait now. 

As far his A-tour perfomances were concerned thats been a while now. No player shud live on long back perfomances

As of now selection of A-tours are concerned Pant n kishen have earned it and both are players with X-factors

Naman is already 33, by the time he finished next Domestic season he ll be 34......where the 1st thing is he has to make runs. I dnt see selectors backing a 34 old . That would only happen if saha, parthiv, pant, kishen screw up who are standing in line before him. 

 

IF saha is booted out , parthiv will play. HE made runs and will book a berth in squad as backup keeper and backup opener. So No way even ojha will find a place even in squad

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12 hours ago, laaloo said:

We have always been good at home but when have we been this good? We're whitewashing teams at home like no business. 3-0 against NZ. 2-0 against SA. Should have been 3-0 but because of weather. 4-0 against Eng. Now tied with Aus at 1-1.

3-0 against South Africa and the 4th test was washed out.

 

You are absolutely right.

 

We have now won 16 tests out of the last 20  finished test matches we have played  after Kohli became captain in a full series...... defeated every nation we play tests against and won 2 away series too.

 

Such high % of test wins have never happened before for a 20 match span.  ( 22  if we include the washed out test matches )

Edited by express bowling
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We are so dominant in Asia+WI that we don't even need to do much in RSA/NZ/Eng/Aus to cement our position as the undisputed number 1 team. Even for example if we win 1, draw 2 and lose 1 out the 4 series no one can point fingers at us because at home we will crush them like bugs. Not very difficult to surpass the 2007-10 team plus we won't have a steep fall like they had in 2011. 

 

But if we are to transcend that and truly be a team to remember for the ages we have to beat either RSA or Aus in the coming cycle. These 2 are historically the greatest test teams in terms of W/L, and no Asian team has ever won there. I hope we avenge England and NZ for the embarrassment they inflicted last time around but what I am really interested to see is our tours to RSA and Aus. I believe we can conquer RSA because since 2006 we have always competed well there against a fearsome side. No reason why we can't go one step further this time. But Australia will be difficult. We should have won there in '78, '81, '85, '03 and '07 but we were cheated out of series victories on each of the occasions :((.  Bloody cheateroos.:bumsmack::wall:

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15 hours ago, Ultimate_Game said:

We were pretty good in 90s as well but the litmus test will be when we tour away. Really want us to be more competitive away and if we are able to win at either Aus or SA that would be a cherry on the top.

No doubt that we have to win in ENG, SA, AUs and NZ but even during 90s, when did we used to whitewash teams at home? The only one I recall was England in 1993. 17 tests unbeaten streak is no easy task.

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6 minutes ago, laaloo said:

No doubt that we have to win in ENG, SA, AUs and NZ but even during 90s, when did we used to whitewash teams at home? The only one I recall was England in 1993. 17 tests unbeaten streak is no easy task.

The whitewash is more due to the fact that there's hardly any draws in Tests these days due to advent of T20 cricket. Unless weather intervenes most of the Tests end up in a result. Our 90s team was pretty strong at home as well with likes of Sidhu, Azhar, Tendulkar etc. manning the batting, spinners headed by Kumble (with Raju, Chauhan etc. as support cast) and pace dept backed by Srinath and Prasad. Just because we didn't whitewash teams didn't mean we weren't good. We were tough to beat at home and were always the favorites against other teams.

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On 3/8/2017 at 4:19 PM, Gollum said:

 

 

How do compare this team with the 2007-10 team, personnel wise, mental toughness wise etc? 

There are 2 aspects to compare.


Performance and potential.

 

2007-10 was a super performing team all over the world (won in Eng, NZ....fought well in Aus and almost won in SA - SL fiasco is ok considering Mendis was a mystery spinner and Murali was Murali).

 

Performance of this team in spin conditions has been as stellar as it could get. There is a weakness in this team against quality spin but there is a good chance we will improve on that too as we play more games on turners (Rahul, Vijay, Nair, Kohli are very good and Pujara is very proven against spin). Performance in outside Asia is unknown which only time will tell. We have a few pieces of jigsaw to solve but we are almost there.

 

Now coming to potential, at the risk of over-rating this team, I think this team has MORE potential than that.

 

While we don't have an equivalent of SRT of 2007-10 or the bowling-brainpower combo of Zak...this team is more well rounded. Dravid of that team wasn't the same in 2007-10, Ganguly retired in 2008, Kumble retired in 2008, Bhajji bowled some big match winning spells home and away but was declining...but Sehwag and Gambo were very very good in that period.

 

This team on the other hand:

 

1. Our openers Rahul and Vijay are all conditions bat.

2. Rahane and Kohli have proven themselves outside Asia (Kohli except for England has done well everywhere).

3. Pujara has been a failure but now he looks super fluent and even if he averages 35 in this overseas cycle with impact runs, we would be fine cos he stitches so many partnerships. If Pujara averages 45+ in the overseas cycle with others performing as well, then this lineup can do wonders.

4. Then you have 6th bat in Nair who is unproven as of now but let's see how he goes. Mostly we won't play a 6th bat in overseas conditions cos Kohli knows 5 bowlers are a must to take 20 wickets.

5. Solid keeper in Saha who seems to bat better post 20 balls. I think with more confidence in his spot, he will do much better.

6. As for bowling, we have bowlers who combine pace with accuracy and 2 high performing spinners.

 

The thing that really separates this team is:

 

1. Kohli the captain - We really needed a captain like him. Yes, he can oscillate between legendary captaincy and garbage captaincy but the way he leads and the environment he has created is just so amazing. This team BELIEVES.

 

2. Presence of dark horses - We have 3 dark horses in this squad. Rahul, Ashwin and Shami. All 3 injury prone as of now but at their best, they are shockingly good. Then you have Umesh and Jaddu who can deliver important strikes too. The 2007-10 team was a well oiled machine but they didn't have such dark horses.

 

So all in all...potentially this team is even better. Could go on to achieve more if they apply well.

 

However there is a big gap between potential and results.

 

Take Vijay and Rahul. When they apply properly, India could score 100-0 on a tough pitch but at the same time, we could find ourselves at 20-2 in the simplest of pattas.

 

It all lies in application plus LUCK (we need all 3 - Rahul, Ashwin and Shami to be fully fit for the overseas leg).

Edited by sensible-indian
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1 hour ago, sensible-indian said:

There are 2 aspects to compare.


Performance and potential.

 

2007-10 was a super performing team all over the world (won in Eng, NZ....fought well in Aus and almost won in SA - SL fiasco is ok considering Mendis was a mystery spinner and Murali was Murali).

 

Performance of this team in spin conditions has been as stellar as it could get. There is a weakness in this team against quality spin but there is a good chance we will improve on that too as we play more games on turners (Rahul, Vijay, Nair, Kohli are very good and Pujara is very proven against spin). Performance in outside Asia is unknown which only time will tell. We have a few pieces of jigsaw to solve but we are almost there.

 

Now coming to potential, at the risk of over-rating this team, I think this team has MORE potential than that.

 

While we don't have an equivalent of SRT of 2007-10 or the bowling-brainpower combo of Zak...this team is more well rounded. Dravid of that team wasn't the same in 2007-10, Ganguly retired in 2008, Kumble retired in 2008, Bhajji bowled some big match winning spells home and away but was declining...but Sehwag and Gambo were very very good in that period.

 

This team on the other hand:

 

1. Our openers Rahul and Vijay are all conditions bat.

2. Rahane and Kohli have proven themselves outside Asia (Kohli except for England has done well everywhere).

3. Pujara has been a failure but now he looks super fluent and even if he averages 35 in this overseas cycle with impact runs, we would be fine cos he stitches so many partnerships. If Pujara averages 45+ in the overseas cycle with others performing as well, then this lineup can do wonders.

4. Then you have 6th bat in Nair who is unproven as of now but let's see how he goes. Mostly we won't play a 6th bat in overseas conditions cos Kohli knows 5 bowlers are a must to take 20 wickets.

5. Solid keeper in Saha who seems to bat better post 20 balls. I think with more confidence in his spot, he will do much better.

6. As for bowling, we have bowlers who combine pace with accuracy and 2 high performing spinners.

 

The thing that really separates this team is:

 

1. Kohli the captain - We really needed a captain like him. Yes, he can oscillate between legendary captaincy and garbage captaincy but the way he leads and the environment he has created is just so amazing. This team BELIEVES.

 

2. Presence of dark horses - We have 3 dark horses in this squad. Rahul, Ashwin and Shami. All 3 injury prone as of now but at their best, they are shockingly good. Then you have Umesh and Jaddu who can deliver important strikes too. The 2007-10 team was a well oiled machine but they didn't have such dark horses.

 

So all in all...potentially this team is even better. Could go on to achieve more if they apply well.

 

However there is a big gap between potential and results.

 

Take Vijay and Rahul. When they apply properly, India could score 100-0 on a tough pitch but at the same time, we could find ourselves at 20-2 in the simplest of pattas.

 

It all lies in application plus LUCK (we need all 3 - Rahul, Ashwin and Shami to be fully fit for the overseas leg).

Nice post and thanks for the effort. If I may add, we need to improve our catching by leaps and bounds, else this potential will never translate to results. 

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1 hour ago, Gollum said:

Nice post and thanks for the effort. If I may add, we need to improve our catching by leaps and bounds, else this potential will never translate to results. 

Great point.

 

Catching will make a huge difference. Our current catching is gully mohalla level. Our fielders can lose a close match overseas on their own.

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