This is hurting our cricket

[flamy]

Playing against mediocre teams like Pak is not good for us. There is Sri Lanka coming up, but they have been going down ever since WC '07. Arent there any ODIs against SA in the near future? The Champions Trophy would provide us a much clearer evaluation of our team.

[rahul_desiz]

Fish off that arrogant attitude dude.... we just lost to Pakistan in last match.... in noway, Pakistan and Srilanka are bad teams.. as a matter of fact, they are similar to us

[Guest Hiten.]

Keep quiet flamy :mad:

[Predator_05]

He has a point. No South African, English or Aussie team would roll over and die like this. They are fiercely competitive sides who fight 'til the end. You really have to earn a victory against them. Sri Lanka have a bit more quality (not to mention a bit more backbone) than Pakistan, so i'd expect them to give India a good run for their money. Jayasuriya has redisovered his form in the IPL and he is carrying on in the same vein here in the Asia Cup, so they have a dangerous look about them as well.

[flamy]

Keep quiet flamy :mad:

hahahaha, man people still "hope" for an Indian win here. Guys, you can "analyse" and say that this Indian team is an improving outfit and will keep getting better. Would you expect an Aussie fan to start worrying if another fan was confident that their team can easily win against teams such as Pak or SL?

[punjabi_khota]

I see the Indian team to go up in the ODI rankings chart pretty soon. I would place current Indian team #3 behind Aus and SA. SL is gong down since 07, having lost to Australia and England, England was never a serious ODI threat anyways, PAK is definitely weaker than us and NZ is a on-off team. WI is too inconsistent.

[flamy]

Just saw the official rankings, we are at 4. India is the 3rd best team in the world at the moment. However, there is a lot we can improve upon and I am seeing signs of improvement. I have the patience and confidence to wait.

[Guest Hiten.]

hahahaha, man people still "hope" for an Indian win here. Guys, you can "analyse" and say that this Indian team is an improving outfit and will keep getting better. Would you expect an Aussie fan to start worrying if another fan was confident that their team can easily win against teams such as Pak or SL?

Aussie fan won't worry because their team has won 3 World cups in a row. I agree with you that we have been on the rise since 07, but we (as fans) and the team should be looking to win on consistent basis for another year or so. If you really are tagging our team as 'world beater', then please stop boasting about the wins we earn and look ahead for the next fixture. Because 'world beaters' have a routine of winning :winky: ....get my point ?

[flamy]

Did I say "world beater" ?

[satishg]

flamy maybe rite in one aspect..like v are much stronger than Pakistan and Srilanka..there is no doubt about it..and if they do manage to beat us in that one off game somewhere it doesn change anything..as u guys have mentioned v are rite now at no 3 in the world and our real challenge wud be against SA or Aus in testing conditions..for that matter even against NZ and Eng in a seaming wicket i wud love to see how our young team is performing..so until then ill reserve my judgements..v are not world beaters rite now but v are slowly but surely getting there..but the young team has to face stiffer oppositions in tuf conditions to get that tag..

[flamy]

Playing against mediocre teams like Pak is not good for us. There is Sri Lanka coming up, but they have been going down ever since WC '07. Arent there any ODIs against SA in the near future? The Champions Trophy would provide us a much clearer evaluation of our team.

Actually, some people have totally missed the point I was making. Winning against teams weaker than us will only forward the illusion that we are an amazing team. I want our young team to face tougher opposition.

[Guest Hiten.]

@ flamy, my apologies. You did not say 'world beater' but you are demeaning a team by calling them a 'mediocre' team. That too who beat us in the finals (kitply cup) @satish. You might be right by calling us stronger than SL and Pakistan. But your statement can be justifiable only to an Indian supporter. Us winning the Asia cup will make your statement justifiable to the whole world and most importantly Asian fans. All I am asking from you guys is no over the top reaction. Yeah we chased 300 in 42 overs, good stuff. Lets move on. Let our boys finish the Asia cup Assignment successfully then we can have all sorts of threads to brag...because we will be Asian champions :proud:

[Ram]

I think its more a question of We being far far better than most of the opposition, than the case of the opposition's quality going down. Pakistan/Lanka were,are and will be decent, competitive sides. Only, our levels have gone up so much that they look mediocre. The greatest aspect of our batting line-up is that EVERY wicket is a big wicket for the opposition. At the top, we have Gambhir, arguably the world's most consistent batsman in LOI in the last 12 months, given his performances in the T20 WC, CB series and IPL. Then comes Sehwag, the butcher. He is followed by Sharma, the silken murderer, with a rare combination of technique and power. Top-Gun Yuvi is next, followed by Raina Re-loaded and Indian cricket MVP Dhoni. If you get past all these guys, in comes power-bomb Yusuf. There's simply no respite for the opposition. If you dismiss one dangerous batsman, someone who is probably even more dangerous comes in. Gone are the times when we had weak-links in our batting, batsman like Sanjay Manjrekar, who come in and kill the momentum of the game. And Imagine what will happen if Sachin is back!

[satishg]

BB u are rite as in an indian supporter wud say wat i had typed there..but then v are the most knowledgeable cricketing country in the world..so in the end wen v say things its most rightly to be true :D hehe anyway im not going over the top here i still know v have to win the asia cup but surely an avg cricket fan wud know that this Indian team is in the top 3 of world cricket rite now.. And Sriram has hit the bulls eye in describing abt out batting order..and once THE BOSS is back its jus no stopping us :yay: but v have a long way to go in the bowling department..agreed the pitches are flat..but v have to learn to bowl in these conditions coz the next world cup is in our country and v are going to face the same conditions then also..so the sooner our young attack learns the better it is going to be for us..

[Ram]

How`can we possibly improve our bowling? This is probably as good as our bowling will ever get, with Kumar, Ishant, RPS and Chawla. Even if Sree, Zak and Bhajji are available again, I would pick the current attack over 'em. Bhajji is more containing, but Chawla takes more wickets. In this melee, we have conveniently forgotten Irfan!

[satishg]

How`can we possibly improve our bowling? This is probably as good as our bowling will ever get, with Kumar, Ishant, RPS and Chawla. Even if Sree, Zak and Bhajji are available again, I would pick the current attack over 'em. Bhajji is more containing, but Chawla takes more wickets. In this melee, we have conveniently forgotten Irfan!

Sriram v cant go about giving 300 in all the matches..thats wat i mean..ok against Pakistan v are able to chase it easily but against Australia or SA on a flat track chasing 300 or more frequently wont be that easy..so v really need to step it up wen bowling in these conditions..im not saying v need to bring in new bowlers v have a fantastic young attack and once Zak is back our attack wud be further bolstered but then starting frm the Aussie series last october our bowlers have always gone for runs in these conditions..so dont u think something has to be done about it??

[flamy]

The areas we can improve are: 1. Spin department. We do not have one specialist spinner who can weave magic. Heck, we don't have one we can reliably depend upon. Bhajji is not reliable and the rest are actually lot worse. We need to pay serious attention to this over the next coupla years. 2. Fast bowling on FLAT tracks. I understand it can be very daunting and very much unfair to the fast bowler, but these bowlers have been playing their cricket in these conditions ever since they started. 3. Fielding loses intensity once the opposition is in a good position. Not much of a concern because fielding has been improving gradually. And, our batting is looking very good. Every one of the batsmen can easily bat at a SR of 100+. There were some worries that that our batsmen won't be able to play long innings, but they have shown promise so far and I expect them to improve. Right now, Rohit is the only weak link. But, he must be persisted with. After all, how many teams will have ALL the 11 in good form at any given time? Our biggest plus is of course, Dhoni and his captaincy and wicket-keeping and crucial batting. But, I'd like him to do a bit more and be more pro-active when the opponents are in a strong position and are batting India out of the game. If Malik didn't walk away, things could've been different for India. Sure, Dhoni is not the one bowling, and I understand the pitch was difficult bowling-wise. But, such is the standards Dhoni has set now that I can't help nitpicking. :D

[nitinbwj]

Parveen kumar is useless on flat tracks.we need the pace of sreesanth and ishant and ofcourse bhajji

[DomainK]

1. It was not too long ago that we played Australia and the SA. Arguably they are the two better teams than India. We cant play them all the time...we have to play with other teams as well. 2. Pakistan and Srilanka are not that bad. Its a little too arrogant to call them mediocre. We lost to Pakistan the last time we played them in a final and with Murali and Sanath, we can very well lose to Lanka when they get going. We have just started winning well. Its time to be down to earth. Humility is an essential quality of a winner.

[vadodaravictor]

Well, if winning agains PAK and SL (both of which I think are good teams if not the best) is going to boost confidence of youngsters, I am all for it. At least it is better than loosing badly to Aus/SA and going low on confidence/morale. If we keep winnning, we might perform better at bigger stage.