Dhoni’s blunders cost India a crucial game

In what can be arguably seen as the biggest series of captaincy blunders in the World Cup, Mahendra Singh Dhoni somehow managed to wrest back India’s age old habit of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. Right from the selection of Munaf Patel over Ravichandran Ashwin or Shantakumaran Sreesanth (yes, you heard it right!) to giving Ashish Nehra the final over, Dhoni made one blunder after the other and handed the South Africans a crucial win and huge brownie points in terms of psychological build-up going into the quarterfinals

For most part of 38 overs, India looked like scoring about 350 runs. However, horror unfolded for all the fans at Nagpur as batsman after batsman made heavy weather of what should have been an easy ride towards 320 at least. At the end of the day, India didn’t even make it past 300 and failed to bat out 50 overs. Nine wickets fell for 28 runs - inexplicably. If this happened with Pakistan playing, there would be “match fixing” rumours doing the rounds.

However, this was more about how a captain who has been riding his luck so far, finally got his come uppance and all his decisions came to bite him.

First things first, team selection. Sreesanth has done well against the South Africans, however he was kept on the bench and Munaf brought back in. Even Ashwin would have been a better bet. As it turned out Munaf gave away 14 runs in the 47th over to allow the South Africans getvback in the game.

Yusuf Pathan seems woefully out of place, and maybe Suresh Raina’s inclusion in place of either Yusuf or Gautam Gambhir may have tilted the scales for India.

Another penchant of Dhoni has been tinkering with the batting order at will. Sending in Yusuf during the powerplays was absolutely unnecessary. His continuous abuse of Virat Kohli’s position means that India’s “flexible” middle-order is also fallible, as has been displayed in all the matches. The batsmen, too, did not help their cause by being too flashy and throwing away their wickets.

Dhoni seemed to have taken a leaf out of Andrew Strauss’ book in terms of batting Powerplays. With Sachin Tendulkar and Gambhir on song, he decided to go for the batting Powerplay, which ultimately led to India’s batting collapse, similar to England. To add to it, he passively stood while wickets kept tumbling making no effort to arrest the rot or make an attempt to play out the 50 overs.

When the South Africans were batting, two crucial errors in Munaf  bowling the 47th over and Ashish Nehra the final over, were the final nails in the coffin for India. The faces in the crowd at Nagpur, told the story, when they realized Nehra would bowl the final over. Two length deliveries later the momentum and the match was handed on a platter to South Africa.

On a day where we were treated to some fabulous entertainment by Sehwag and Tendulkar, the rest of the Indian batsman managed to implode to take away what would have been a stupendous victory for India.

It’s time for Dhoni to get his head out of his backside and do what a leader needs to do. Pick the right team and not indulge in favoritism, like he did for Piyush Chawla. Let Ashwin and Raina get a look in. Let Gambhir sit out. Though he scored 69, it was a painstaking innings which let the South African bowlers get back into the game.

It’s lucky this game does not cost India in the overall stakes, since the quarter-final berth is more or less assured. However, with this kind of a display, it might be good for the Indian think-tank to get their act together, to deal with situations when their top two batsmen score runs for most part of the innings and the remaining have to finish it off and ensure a good score. It’s twice now the batting has failed in such situations.

Dhoni has been carrying the tag of “Captain Cool” for a while now. But if he insists on carrying his stubborn and mindless ways that continue shock an entire nation, that tag may give way to “Captain Fool”. Let’s hope that Dhoni turns a new leaf to lead the charge of Team India.

Source: http://www.cricketcountry.com/cricket-articles/Dhoni-s-blunders-cost-India-a-crucial-game/1171?utm_source=P%3DCB&utm_medium=300*600Html&utm_campaign=300*600Html