5-man bowling attack for next test

[King Tendulkar]

5 bowlers:hysterical: Look this bravdo is great on paper. But this test cricket. Please 80/4 we will all be crying why no 6th batter

[vvvslaxman]

If you look t the scorecard carefully only two batsmen have stepped up. Others merely supported them on the back of their performances. If Pujara and Kohli has a failure we are going to be rolled over in no time. lol. We only do "mathematical analysis" when it comes to team selection not "pragmatic analysis"

[Marut]

No way we can afford to weaken our batting while playing outside India. Not against these bowlers anyway. Don't be deceived by the scores India made in test one - it was hardly a team performance - just one or two big partnerships in there, and wickets fell in a flurry on either side of Kohli and Pujara. I am afraid if one of these batsmen fail, India will be shot out for <200.

[cricketpitch]

Jadeja should replace Ashwin if we are looking for one spinner. It depends on how confident Dhoni is with the batting of Jaddu as playing Yadav means that we will be having a long tail. The Indian tail can fall without much fight which might make a huge difference in a close game. With Dhoni and Jaddu, followed by 4 bowlers who cannot bat to save their lives will leave us only 5 batsmen with scoring potential. This will put too much pressure on Pujara and Kohli. Dhawan doesn't inspire any confidence and Rohit can be hit or miss. It will be difficult for India to go with 5 bowlers.

[vvvslaxman]

Jadeja should replace Ashwin if we are looking for one spinner. It depends on how confident Dhoni is with the batting of Jaddu as playing Yadav means that we will be having a long tail. The Indian tail can fall without much fight which might make a huge difference in a close game. With Dhoni and Jaddu, followed by 4 bowlers who cannot bat to save their lives will leave us only 5 batsmen with scoring potential. This will put too much pressure on Pujara and Kohli. Dhawan doesn't inspire any confidence and Rohit can be hit or miss. It will be difficult for India to go with 5 bowlers.

Dhawan, Rohit.. they can go either way. Also law of average might catch up with Kohli. Still a dicey situation.

[I6MTW]

For Jadeja to be in the team, he should score runs and take wickets. Otherwise, I think he will be useless. Jadeja should play a role for IND to win. Otherwise it'll be very difficult to win.

[Lord]

For Jadeja to be in the team, he should score runs and take wickets. Otherwise, I think he will be useless. Jadeja should play a role for IND to win. Otherwise it'll be very difficult to win.

captain obvious?

[I6MTW]

captain obvious?

Why do you think that? I'm merely saying that Jadeja should be useful this time.

[cricketpitch]

Dhawan' date=' Rohit.. they can go either way. Also law of average might catch up with Kohli. Still a dicey situation.[/quote'] Yup thats the reason I feel that India playing 5 bowlers is not a possibility. The only change I can see is Ashwin being replaced by either Yadav or Jadeja. We did not play 5 bowlers when we had Sehwag, Gambhir, Sachin, Dravid, and Laxman and I am sure we are not going to do that with this inexperienced lineup.

[Ram]

They are not going to drop Rohit, but playing Jadeja for Ash is probably a realistic option. His accomplished batting record in test matches, the team is getting close to nothing from Ash from a bowling standpoint this tour. If anything, Jaddu outbowled in the odi games too. But the team itself has high opinion of Ashin - They like him, they like his aggression as a cricketer, they like his intellect, his controlled bowling, his under-rated batting and improving slip-catching. It will be hard to let go of a guy who went to 100 test wickets faster than Dale Steyn did.

[ThePhenomenal1]

No way we can afford to weaken our batting while playing outside India. Not against these bowlers anyway. Don't be deceived by the scores India made in test one - it was hardly a team performance - just one or two big partnerships in there' date=' and wickets fell in a flurry on either side of Kohli and Pujara. I am afraid if one of these batsmen fail, India will be shot out for <200.[/quote'] I thought vijay did his bit. 1st test to SA as an opener against world's best attack, number 1 and 2 bowlers in the world, and he survived a number of deliveries. Got a feeling he will do better, he seems to learn fast. Its our lower order that has struggled. Rohit hasn't stepped up overseas and we need him to come in and make some runs because there is a tendency to get lazy after a big partnership, like pujara-kohli on day 3-4. Rahane did well but needs to hang in there and not get bogged down which is his weakness. I like his intent and he saved the match in the end. It was a team performane, just a few members didn't shown up like ashwin, dhawan, rohit

[ThePhenomenal1]

Btw 4 bowlers is enough: 3 pacers and jadeja or 4 pacers with rohit/dhawan bowling some off spin whatever. About the tail being long, well it needs to hang in there and just defend, score runs when you can and replicate the batsmen before you. Easier said than done but needs to be done. Someone like zak will go and score but ishant, shami etc should play cautiously. Batsmen should score, tailenders should add bonus runs

[Trichromatic]

Given as many chances to any keeper, they would also come good.Even guy like Ajay Rathra had scored 100 in WI, Dhoni by accident should have scored a 100 he played so many tests on roads away from home. The only 100 he scored away from home was on the grand daddy of all roads in Faisalabad. Yes Sehwag and Dravid stunk in SA along with other batsmen who have stunk in some other placs at various times, now you know why Indian batting with all their glittering records has this wonderful reputation of HTBs and lambs ready to be slaughtered when touring abroad and we have 0-8 as a result of carrying these passengers. This is a young batting unit which is eager to prove its worth away from home and we don't need anyone to drag them down with their ineptitude. Indian team will always do okay at home they don't need Dhoni to be good at home they will be good with or without Dhoni at home. Let Dhoni concentrate on ODI and leave test cricket to someone else.

So, if Dhoni had scored 8-10 runs more in some of his innings, he would have suddenly become good batsman with 3 overseas hundreds? Since 1990s - Out of top 10 scores by Indian WK batsmen, 7 are by Dhoni. There were not even many flukes either. Out of 20 half-centuries by Indian-WK, 10 are by MSD in 29 matches overseas. India has played 81 tests. Dhoni averages 29 overseas while Sehwag averages 35. 6 - average difference between one of the best Indian opener and a glorified tail-ender. Given as many chances to any keeper, they would also come good - Nothing supports that at all.

[rkt.india]

4 bowlers are enough if they all can pick up wickets. Problem in this test was Ashwin did not take wicket and there were virtually 3 bowlers taking wickets and that is why it looks we were a bowler short.

[Temujin Khaghan]

jadeja is not a batsman outside india...

[JourneyMan]

Rohit Sharma is being mentioned as a bowling option, but Dhoni didn't even use him in the first test. If Kingsmeade is assisting spinners as it previously has, I hope he doesn't overlook this.

[shortbread]

Rohit Sharma is being mentioned as a bowling option' date=' but Dhoni didn't even use him in the first test. If Kingsmeade is assisting spinners as it previously has, I hope he doesn't overlook this.[/quote'] The only bowling option Rohit should provide is replace him with a bowler!! Yadav or Ashwin should have played instead.

[JourneyMan]

The only bowling option Rohit should provide is replace him with a bowler!! Yadav or Ashwin should have played instead.

Ideally, yes. For some reason Dhoni seems to think there's a law against playing 5 bowlers.