Is it wise to take matches to the last over finish so many times?

[jalebi_bhai]

In CT England needed 20 to win off 16 balls with 6 wickets in hand. Lost the match. Maybe chases (that too in the final) look easy but are much tougher

+1 People underestimate the way panic and pressure affects people in the heat of the moment.......his approach is fine......as long as you have the ability......which Dhoni does......

[BeautifulGame]

Who isnt :).

Well i centainly am not :P

[Cricketics]

You shoul remember he had to see through Malinga's spell. That allowed him to later hit. Even Mendis was bowling good line and got thw wicket if Vinay Kumar. You coildnt have slogged right away.

[BeautifulGame]

Couldn't be happier for u and hang on to it :).

U still seem pissed off with yesterday's result :(( Maybe time to let it go rathe:((r than hanging on to it

[adi B]

http://www.theunrealtimes.com/2013/07/07/in-pictures-ms-dhoni-turns-32/ :phehehe: Dhoni ki aadat ho gayi hai match ko last tak lejaane ki - its good while we win but someday this will cost him (and the team) really big. I mean yesterday's match should have been finished at least 4-5 overs earlier but ended up going to the last over. He did great in the last over but IMO the match should never have gone to the last over.

it did cost us a place in the finals of cb series 012 where we tied with lanka ,had we won that match we would have made the finals..mind u we needed 9(i think) of the final ovr and the difference was, it was malinga,so he could not score easily

[adi B]

Difference between Dhoni and most of the guys is all he needs is a non striker lol.. He can do all by himself. Richards' date=' Jayasuriya are couple of names that come to my minds. Fantastic cricketing sense and self belief this man has.[/quote'] yeah very true..have so though pissant did well to negate that penultimate over(though it was foolishness of dhoni to let him face an entire ovr),i was biting my nails thinking that POS will beout any ball but credit to him he played well :hatsoff:

[CSK Fan]

As someone was saying, what SL need to do to win against India is to convince Dhoni its a 51 over game

[CSK Fan]

Isnt that the approach we used to try in 90s and 2000s till Dhoni came? Didnt we lose almost every big game, in collapses and panics with this approach of finishing the matches quickly. How many times our batsmen tried to win in a hurry once Sachin got out and collapsed like a pack of cards before Dhoni . His ability and his approach results in wins most of the time. Yep it may result in loses sometimes but the percentage of wins is unparalleled in our ODI history

Come on, you are not being fair. We have tailenders today (from all teams) who put a price on their wicket. In the 90s and 2000s our tailenders would throw wickets away even when the RRR was under 5. BK and Ishant wont do that today. Not to mention, our bowlers are also making the target lesser than before Also, most time in ODIs Sachin scored we did win so you are exaggerating about the collapses. collapses had more to do with not having a good late order bat and nothing to do with finishing early. In yesterday's match the RRR was less than 5 and Dhoni took it to 15+ Wont work against stronger teams

[jusarrived]

What some of you dont understand is that its not entirely intentional to take the match to last over....in situations like this all he does is to make sure he doesnt his wicket away and score only if opportunity given....the idea is to give yourself a chance to win..just get close to the total. The pitch and malinga factor made it very difficult yesterday as well . Any other batsmen we would have lost the match by 40 runs

[jusarrived]

Come on, you are not being fair. We have tailenders today (from all teams) who put a price on their wicket. In the 90s and 2000s our tailenders would throw wickets away even when the RRR was under 5. BK and Ishant wont do that today. Not to mention, our bowlers are also making the target lesser than before Also, most time in ODIs Sachin scored we did win so you are exaggerating about the collapses. collapses had more to do with not having a good late order bat and nothing to do with finishing early. In yesterday's match the RRR was less than 5 and Dhoni took it to 15+ Wont work against stronger teams

So why did Tendulkar trow his wicket away in the match against Aus chasing 350 ? This wasrecent and almost the same set of tailenders ....why was he in a hurry to finish the match himself then ? According to you its all so easy these days . The poor guy jadeja was blamed for the match loss

[maniac]

What some of you dont understand is that its not entirely intentional to take the match to last over....in situations like this all he does is to make sure he doesnt his wicket away and score only if opportunity given....the idea is to give yourself a chance to win..just get close to the total. The pitch and malinga factor made it very difficult yesterday as well . Any other batsmen we would have lost the match by 40 runs

How many balls did he expose the tailenders to? He got lucky there.....Ishant played out one full over and V.K played more than half a Malinga over....In that situation any half-brain guy would try to win the game,It looks good because it came off and he had to face some Tundler like Eranga,but it still stays as a stupid move.

[The Outsider]

Wise or not.. probably his testosterone level increases 10 times in the last over lol. He likes to get as close as possible and tee off. More often than not it works for him be it is India or CSK. 1Remember 19 in 3 was all required during epic 175 of Tendulkar. Tendulkar 175 not out' date=' Jadeja 23 not out in 16 balls. That was easy paced wicket. Over here Dhoni played with tail 19 in 3 required just 2 wickets in hand on a difficult surface. [b']Why couldn't they finish earlier there? Tendulkar took a risk much earlier and triggered a collapse.

Because Tendulkar was batting for more than 3 hours at 175, 47 overs into the innings after being on the field the entire first innings as well, and Dhoni had batted for around 15 overs and was coming off a 35 over break. The chances of a batsman making a mistake increase with fatigue and it becomes more difficult to concentrate. That is why you can't typically expect openers to finish off an innings.

[vvvslaxman]

How many balls did he expose the tailenders to? He got lucky there.....Ishant played out one full over and V.K played more than half a Malinga over....In that situation any half-brain guy would try to win the game,It looks good because it came off and he had to face some Tundler like Eranga,but it still stays as a stupid move.

With tailenders you always need a bit of luck though. It is impossible to completely shield tailenders. In the process of getting to striker end you could get run out which is exactly what Raina did in Asia cup against Pakistan. He got run out. Thankfully Bhajan finished it for us. In this match also Raina played a risky shot against full pitched delivery. Thinking of tailenders will be so random and they could get run out any time in an attempt to steal a single. With 24 runs required in 30 balls if he goes after bowling and gets out i would see the comment "brain fart" from millions of fans across the country. Dhoni is probably the best in assessing risk/reward ratio. Although for arm chair experts like me and you, it appeared to be dumb and foolish, man who has been in such situation so many times is in better position to assess what risk is worth what risk is not worth.

[vvvslaxman]

Because Tendulkar was batting for more than 3 hours at 175, 47 overs into the innings after being on the field the entire first innings as well, and Dhoni had batted for around 15 overs and was coming off a 35 over break. The chances of a batsman making a mistake increase with fatigue and it becomes more difficult to concentrate. That is why you can't typically expect openers to finish off an innings.

Come on man.. In test matches he is used to batting for more than that. You seriously think Tendulkar botteld it because of fatigue? I don't think so. 19 in 3 overs? Seriously.. fatigue got to him? Atleast i would buy that excuse in the test against pakistan. Even there i was not satisfied.. Even sunny said after the match "Don't leave the job to others to finish". Nobody denies the quality of the knock. But end result *YAWN* .

[The Outsider]

Come on man.. In test matches he is used to batting for more than that. You seriously think Tendulkar botteld it because of fatigue? I don't think so. 19 in 3 overs? Seriously.. fatigue got to him? Atleast i would buy that excuse in the test against pakistan. Even there i was not satisfied.. Even sunny said after the match "Don't leave the job to others to finish". Nobody denies the quality of the knock. But end result *YAWN* .

Are you seriously comparing the intensity of batting in an ODI with test matches? In tests, one can easily go into periods of defense and charge your batteries and there are also the lunch and tea breaks every 2 hours. In tests, one would typically score 175 runs over 3-4 sessions. Did you see how Tendulkar was fatigued when he scored the 200 and how Dhoni was smashing everything at the other end because he was fresh at the crease, even though Tendulkar was smashing the same bowling earlier? Fatigue is not some binary thing - at that level every little bit of tiredness can effect your game. It could even be the reason that Tendulkar decided to go for the paddle shot instead of going down the ground because it takes less power to execute.

[Crookbond]

Are you seriously comparing the intensity of batting in an ODI with test matches? In tests, one can easily go into periods of defense and charge your batteries and there are also the lunch and tea breaks every 2 hours. In tests, one would typically score 175 runs over 3-4 sessions. Did you see how Tendulkar was fatigued when he scored the 200 and how Dhoni was smashing everything at the other end because he was fresh at the crease, even though Tendulkar was smashing the same bowling earlier? Fatigue is not some binary thing - at that level every little bit of tiredness can effect your game. It could even be the reason that Tendulkar decided to go for the paddle shot instead of going down the ground because it takes less power to execute.

I do not know whether it was fatigue, brain freeze etc. but it was a false shot. I guess he did not even read the ball as the ball from McKay was a slower one.

[vvvslaxman]

Are you seriously comparing the intensity of batting in an ODI with test matches? In tests, one can easily go into periods of defense and charge your batteries and there are also the lunch and tea breaks every 2 hours. In tests, one would typically score 175 runs over 3-4 sessions. Did you see how Tendulkar was fatigued when he scored the 200 and how Dhoni was smashing everything at the other end because he was fresh at the crease, even though Tendulkar was smashing the same bowling earlier? Fatigue is not some binary thing - at that level every little bit of tiredness can effect your game. It could even be the reason that Tendulkar decided to go for the paddle shot instead of going down the ground because it takes less power to execute.

Tendulkar has played big shots after 45 overs before.. I remember he ran all over Vaas in 1996 world cup. Now age will come into play lol. Cramping does happen. Infact Dhoni played through hamstring injury to earn a win against Bangladesh. But during his 175 saying his false shot due to fatigue is only a theory. Not a fact. You know you have only 4 wickets left. You have a batsman who is batting well with you. More than India losing, i felt bad that a great knock like that went in vain. It is not like Tendulkar gets a chance to finish every other day. That was probably what first time since Sharjah desert storm where umpired did him in.

[vvvslaxman]

Just in case you think batsmen who bat for 40 overs will struggle to finish matches http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/match/223634.html Dhoni finished this match as a rookie http://www.espncricinfo.com/the-ashes-2010-11/engine/match/446962.html?innings=1;view=commentary Here is another match. Watson finished with a six in the 50th over http://www.espncricinfo.com/indvsl2009/engine/match/430889.html?innings=2;page=1;view=commentary Gambhir played for nearly 48 overs and was there till India won Most recently Martin Guptill scored 32 runs in the last 2 overs of the match during his 189 against England http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/match/566924.html

[The Outsider]

Tendulkar has played big shots after 45 overs before.. I remember he ran all over Vaas in 1996 world cup. Now age will come into play lol. Cramping does happen. Infact Dhoni played through hamstring injury to earn a win against Bangladesh. But during his 175 saying his false shot due to fatigue is only a theory. Not a fact. You know you have only 4 wickets left. You have a batsman who is batting well with you. More than India losing' date= i felt bad that a great knock like that went in vain. It is not like Tendulkar gets a chance to finish every other day. That was probably what first time since Sharjah desert storm where umpired did him in.

Not sure what's there to LOL? In 1996, Tendulkar was 23 and was 37 at the time of the 175. It should be obvious that a 23 year old is fitter than a 37 year old in general. Perhaps, if you think of it in a more generic manner than binary where either a batsman is fatigued or not, you will get my point. Even if you talk about it from personal experience you will understand that the chances of you having a lapse of concentration or making a mistake are higher when you have been batting for 3 hours as opposed to 1 hour. Fatigue is not just having cramps, but even minor slowing down of reflexes or clarity of thought in that split second can be the difference between failure and success. My essential point is that it's not a fair argument to compare the finishing of someone who has batted the entire innings with someone who has been at the crease for an hour or so. The baseline of the two batsmen is way off to have a one to one comparison with respect to being able to finish the game.

[The Outsider]

Just in case you think batsmen who bat for 40 overs will struggle to finish matches http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/match/223634.html Dhoni finished this match as a rookie http://www.espncricinfo.com/the-ashes-2010-11/engine/match/446962.html?innings=1;view=commentary Here is another match. Watson finished with a six in the 50th over http://www.espncricinfo.com/indvsl2009/engine/match/430889.html?innings=2;page=1;view=commentary Gambhir played for nearly 48 overs and was there till India won Most recently Martin Guptill scored 32 runs in the last 2 overs of the match during his 189 against England http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/match/566924.html

A few counterexamples don't take anything from the essence of the argument. I am not saying that it's impossible for an opener to ever finish a match, but I am saying that the chances of him being able to do so go down significantly compared to someone who is more fresh and rested. How many times in the history of 3000 odd ODIs has an opener been able to finish a match? Not many, and these few and far between instances just exemplify my point that it's bloody difficult for an opener to finish a match.