Really. How bleak is our future ?

[Sid]

Just repeating what Ian Chappell said a while back? No one is "fooling" themselves that India is no.1 and no.2 on the rankings. It is a fact. The OP, frustrated that his team hasn't beaten India in six Tests and needed cheating umpires to win the seventh, is claiming that India shouldn't be called no.1 even though they are, err, no.1. If our batting declines to the point to the extent that we fall down the rankings, fair enough, but for now we are in the top two deservedly.

i am not saying we are not deserving no1 in tests and no2 in odis,but just how we have reached that,as a fan you always had that feeling once our batting starts declining we will struggle big time,becoz i think we as a one day outfit we struggle to defend even 300 runs and if we score 290 or less we are sure that we will lose

[Fair Game]

India have no depth' date=' but we will still beat the Ausies 2-0 in the test series. Hope the OP is happy now.[/quote'] There won't be any tests in india this year against australia. Why would australia want to get tired in tough conditions ahead of an ashes series they have to win. Secondly they don't want to lose and undo the climbing back up the test rankings that they have been doin in the past year and thirdly the last test series the 2 countries played was in india so australia would be stupid to give an advantage like that to india. There is no way india would do the same and end up playing against australia in 2 test series both in australia without having a crack at them in home conditions.

[achilles]

india has the depth' date=' but india also has cheeka[/quote'] He is absolutely unbiased :cheer:

[achilles]

Sorry, but if this is the best 11 India can put out when the top 5 players aren't there, they have no business ever being called the no 1 team in tests or odis. Even if the Indian fans will complain about the selection of the team, it's still pretty close to being their best team when the top 5 players are missing. Australia went to India without the best 7 players last year and still smashed them black and blue. That's what depth is. There is no depth in Indian cricket.

Thats making a big statement.

[Ultimate_Game]

[DEL]Ishant Sharma[/DEL] ----- okay its nine... i think u wanted a round figure to make ur point...

Are you saying that you would prefer to have Vinay Kumar over Ishant in any format of the game??? In fact I won't even have Dinda in front of Ishant. My top 3 pacers would be Zaheer, Praveen Kumar and Nehra followed by Sreesanth, Ishant, RP Singh (I still think he offers more than Vinay Kumar or Dinda) and Irfan Pathan.

[hari504504]

Really. How bleak is our future ? A Srilankan B team(once) and decent but still some way from being comeptitive Zimbabwe(twice) have the wiped the floor with our young guns. 1)Raina can't captain..he shouldn;t even be vice captain in the future 2)Our batting is still fairly decent 3) Our bowling is AWFUL.. it is like those days when Kuruvilla and PRasad opened our bowling Except that there is no Kumble to come later One can talk about 'flat pitches'..but everyone played on the same pitch.. The future indeed seems bleak.

[CSK Fan]

Well, the BCCI bosses are busy hassling over the IPL thing still. Do they even care?

[Pak_Fan_4_Eva]

Bowling is your only problem. None of the youngsters seems promising enough although i guess it`s too early to talk about that. On the issue of Raina, i`s premature to judge his captaincy TBH. I`d say he needs to be groomed properly. Dhoni won`t stick around forever will he? There should always be proper back up

[hari504504]

Dhoni won`t stick around forever will he? There should always be proper back up

Kohli was a world cup winning captain(U-19). Agreed that they needed to try Raina out, well experiment failed and case closed. Not everyone has a captain's brain

[Brainfade]

Over the years, we have been adept at unearthing potential stars .... today, it was Dinesh Chandimal :-(...

[Gunner_Mania]

There won't be any tests in india this year against australia. Why would australia want to get tired in tough conditions ahead of an ashes series they have to win. Secondly they don't want to lose and undo the climbing back up the test rankings that they have been doin in the past year and thirdly the last test series the 2 countries played was in india so australia would be stupid to give an advantage like that to india. There is no way india would do the same and end up playing against australia in 2 test series both in australia without having a crack at them in home conditions.

http://www.indiancricketfans.com/showthread.php?t=226034

[Andy]

Sorry' date= but if this is the best 11 India can put out when the top 5 players aren't there, they have no business ever being called the no 1 team in tests or odis. Even if the Indian fans will complain about the selection of the team, it's still pretty close to being their best team when the top 5 players are missing. Australia went to India without the best 7 players last year and still smashed them black and blue. That's what depth is. There is no depth in Indian cricket.

Stop being Jelous Aussie Retard. We have earned the NO.1 spot in test rankings by beating your sorry team 2-0 in tests. And talking about being without 5 players? Go and check properly, its not 5. We are without our 10 regular players. Players like Yusuf Pathana and Sharma doesnt get place in first 11 regularly. So STFU and come back with a beter logic.

[Karan114]

Indian second-stringers far from the real deal Tristan Holme in Harare Saturday 05-June-2010 18:17 From as early as the 12th over there was an air of inevitability to it. Dinesh Chandimal danced down the pitch to loft Pragyan Ojha's first ball over cow corner for six and Indian heads, still damaged from their second loss to Zimbabwe inside a week, drooped around the field. From that moment on, they looked a beaten side who were waiting to be put out of their misery. It's been an odd sort of tour for a young squad. The last time most of them set foot on a cricket field was in the Indian Premier League, in front of raucous crowds, when they were generally expected to play supporting roles. Stuck on a quaint field in sunny Zimbabwe with no senior players to guide them through tough times, nobody has stood up and shown that they deserve to be playing at the highest level. Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli have scored runs, and their efforts against Sri Lanka in Bulawayo secured India's only victory in a tournament they should have expected to win. Instead the team's trip to Victoria Falls on Sunday could be prolonged as they wait for Zimbabwe and Sri Lanka to play out the series finale and a dress rehearsal two days before it. With both India and Sri Lanka fielding second-string sides and Zimbabwe only just beginning to poke their heads out of the doldrums, this tournament has had the air of a series between A teams. The concern for India will be that some of their IPL stars have been unable to cut it even at this level. The plan was to test bench strength ahead of the World Cup next year, but the only players to perform have been those who are already on the fringes of the first team. Most noticeable has been the complete lack of intensity and an absence of hunger from players who have been given a chance to impress in the 50-over arena. The fact that only six players pitched up for an optional training session on Friday also suggests there's not enough desire to learn from Gary Kirsten's coaching team, whose expertise are not often available to most of them. That attitude was put in stark contrast on Saturday by Chandimal, to whom playing for his country clearly meant something, second-string or not. The wicketkeeper-batsman celebrated his century as if it was a dream come true, but equally noticeable was how disappointed he looked after getting out. The match was in the bag thanks to his 111, yet he walked off with his chin on his chest and barely acknowledged the applause from his teammates, let alone the vuvuzela noise from the crowd. The bottom line is that India's inability to put up a fight is worthy of far more criticism than the results themselves. Suresh Raina must shoulder some of the blame, because as the most experienced member of the squad and the captain it was his responsibility to lift the side during flat periods in the field and instil belief among the younger players. Yet the phrase he uttered most after Thursday's defeat to Zimbabwe when he was asked about the must-win encounter with Sri Lanka was, "we'll hope for the best". The left-hander has been equally disappointing with the bat against opponents you would expect him to dominate. His side now have two Twenty20 matches next weekend to salvage some pride, but on the basis of this tour few of them will be earning another one-day cap in the near future. http://www.cricket365.com/soapbox/story/6192845/Indian-second-stringers-far-from-the-real-deal

[saneindian]

Kirsten has to somehow stop being lenient with the team. I simply don't understand the concept of an optional practice especially after you have lost a game that oo by batting shoddily. The top 6-7 batsmen should have been in the nets sweating it out for 2-3 hours, instead just 6 of them showed up. It's time the support staff stopped mollycoddling this bunch of "brats" and put them through the hard yards and get them to slog it out. Batting and bowling can be excused on account of being inexperienced, but fielding has been absolutely rubbish. For a team with an average age of 23-24, thats simply pathtetic.

[IKnowU]

Kirsten has to somehow stop being lenient with the team. I simply don't understand the concept of an optional practice especially after you have lost a game that oo by batting shoddily. The top 6-7 batsmen should have been in the nets sweating it out for 2-3 hours, instead just 6 of them showed up. It's time the support staff stopped mollycoddling this bunch of "brats" and put them through the hard yards and get them to slog it out. Batting and bowling can be excused on account of being inexperienced, but fielding has been absolutely rubbish. For a team with an average age of 23-24, thats simply pathtetic.

:hysterical: He'lll become Chappal V2.0

[cowboysfan]

I am discounting this series but in the bigger picture we have a rebirth phase coming in the very near future once our stars retire where victories will be hard to come by.If BCCI wants the Indian teams in various formats to be competitive then they desperately need to focus their energy our our Achilles heel,our bowling.Without good strike bowlers we will strictly be a mediocre team which will fail miserably in tournaments as the bowlers simply cannot hold up their end of the bargain.

[Pak_Forever]

Won't say India's batting is bad. Gautum, Kohli and Raina are really good batsmen and can play big roles in the short format of this game. Though I can pretty much predict Indian batting line-up struggling in Test matches regularly once Sachin, Dravid and Laxman are gone. And well for bowling, both pace and spin are really a major concern in all three formats.

[ZodiaC]

I am discounting this series but in the bigger picture we have a rebirth phase coming in the very near future once our stars retire where victories will be hard to come by.If BCCI wants the Indian teams in various formats to be competitive then they desperately need to focus their energy our our Achilles heel' date='our bowling.Without good strike bowlers we will strictly be a mediocre team which will fail miserably in tournaments as the bowlers simply cannot hold up their end of the bargain.[/quote'] Agree. Heck even bangla started producing decent pace bowlers who bowls 140+ :((

[anssrini]

This may or may not be the second best eleven India has, but the way to test bench strength is not by playing the whole of the bench reserve all at once. There should have been atleast one more senior batsman and bowler in the team. This was a big gamble to play all the inexperienced guys together and it backfired. There are days when such a team can fire but we cant expect consistency. Team games are not based on team members performing individually. The younger and the inexperienced may be talented but we may not see their best in the absence of more experienced guys around them. There is a saying that to win a war just kill the senior generals and the rest will scatter in no time without proper direction. Srilanka also did not field their best eleven but they took care to play some more seniors. Though Indian performance was sloppy this is not necessarily an indicator of our future. We must test and improve our bench strength by playing no more than four players from the bench in any given game. Loosing so many matches to weaker teams can be demoralizing and would do little to promote our bench strength.

[King Tendulkar]

This was basically an A tour. And frankly it is good that we did this as we get to see our up and coming players and who could play for the 1st team. Thus as an A tour the results don't reaaly matter but individual performances do. Thus this tour confirms Sharma and Kohli are classy players who can easily play for 1st team in all formats. Thats a real bonus. Also have discvered more pace bowlers in Yadav and Dinda. Who can push the current lot. Also Oijha shows he is a good spinner as well who can step up. Confirms that bits and pieces players like Jadaeja and Pathan are useless. Valuable A tour