‘Wait and watch’, Dhoni on quitting captaincy
20 Aug 2014 4:16 AM IST
To a question that if he is contemplating resignation, Dhoni replied, ‘You will have to wait and watch to find out whether I am strong enough to cope with this loss.’ But has he done enough as India’s Test captain, Dhoni gave a curt one-line reply, ‘May be, yes.’
But after his batsmen failed in five consecutive innings, he did not mince words while assessing the poor show in the last three Test matches. ‘It’s a reflection of the batting order that has not done well,’ said Dhoni after the match had ended in less than three days.
‘Murali Vijay has done well but right from the first Test we have not been able to get a good opening partnership. Cheteshwar Pujara was early to the middle because of that in the 3rd or 4th over itself in every innings. It kept exposing our number three batsman and Virat Kohli went through a lean patch,’ Dhoni explained. The skipper said once a team plays with six batsmen, it’s difficult to lose too many wickets upfront.
‘If you are playing with six batsmen, including the keeper it makes it a bit tough if you lose that many wickets upfront. When the lower order scored runs we made 300-plus totals and once they too got out cheaply then we struggled to put runs on the board,’ he said.
Dhoni didn’t make any bones about the fact that lack of resistance was very disappointing. ‘Yes, we are disappointed that we couldn’t offer any fight in the last three Test matches. Hopefully, the batsmen will take positive out of this defeat when they come back here, all of them are young and good enough to come back here, and do better’ he added, hoping for better times for the Indian batting line-up.
However it does put a question mark on Dhoni himself who, despite being the side’s best batsman at both Manchester and the Oval, will come under scrutiny for his captaincy.
India lost 8-0 in 2011 in England and Australia, and now in 2013-14, the team has lost consecutive series in South Africa, New Zealand and in England again. The question though remains if the Indian team management has taken any lessons from the 2011 loss when they lost 4-0 here to England.
‘The team has changed completely from back then. Whatever strategies I have learned in that series I tried to implement in this series. As a skipper, when you try to manipulate the field you need to see the strengths of the fast bowlers. Our bowlers are different from English bowlers, who keep hitting the same areas.
‘They might be a bit boring but once they get that chance they start attacking you. We have not put enough runs on the board and you may have spent 30 or 40 minutes but when you look at the board there wouldn’t be many runs,’ said Dhoni. On the young players never playing a five-Test series earlier, Dhoni said, ‘It was a long series yes. After the second or third Test I realised it is important to give rest to the bowlers. Ishant Sharma got a break because he got injured.’
But after his batsmen failed in five consecutive innings, he did not mince words while assessing the poor show in the last three Test matches. ‘It’s a reflection of the batting order that has not done well,’ said Dhoni after the match had ended in less than three days.
‘Murali Vijay has done well but right from the first Test we have not been able to get a good opening partnership. Cheteshwar Pujara was early to the middle because of that in the 3rd or 4th over itself in every innings. It kept exposing our number three batsman and Virat Kohli went through a lean patch,’ Dhoni explained. The skipper said once a team plays with six batsmen, it’s difficult to lose too many wickets upfront.
‘If you are playing with six batsmen, including the keeper it makes it a bit tough if you lose that many wickets upfront. When the lower order scored runs we made 300-plus totals and once they too got out cheaply then we struggled to put runs on the board,’ he said.
Dhoni didn’t make any bones about the fact that lack of resistance was very disappointing. ‘Yes, we are disappointed that we couldn’t offer any fight in the last three Test matches. Hopefully, the batsmen will take positive out of this defeat when they come back here, all of them are young and good enough to come back here, and do better’ he added, hoping for better times for the Indian batting line-up.
However it does put a question mark on Dhoni himself who, despite being the side’s best batsman at both Manchester and the Oval, will come under scrutiny for his captaincy.
India lost 8-0 in 2011 in England and Australia, and now in 2013-14, the team has lost consecutive series in South Africa, New Zealand and in England again. The question though remains if the Indian team management has taken any lessons from the 2011 loss when they lost 4-0 here to England.
‘The team has changed completely from back then. Whatever strategies I have learned in that series I tried to implement in this series. As a skipper, when you try to manipulate the field you need to see the strengths of the fast bowlers. Our bowlers are different from English bowlers, who keep hitting the same areas.
‘They might be a bit boring but once they get that chance they start attacking you. We have not put enough runs on the board and you may have spent 30 or 40 minutes but when you look at the board there wouldn’t be many runs,’ said Dhoni. On the young players never playing a five-Test series earlier, Dhoni said, ‘It was a long series yes. After the second or third Test I realised it is important to give rest to the bowlers. Ishant Sharma got a break because he got injured.’
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