T20 World Cup - loss and beyond

Two T20 tournaments, unexpected results, Rajasthan Royals and Team India, failed to live the expectations and fell miserably. Fatigue, poor form of the players led to a sad departure of the favorites in these tournaments. The immensely talked format has surprises, can expose the minutest of the lacking, and has cleared no one can be called favorites. The two semi-finalists of 2009, Sri Lanka and South Africa could not manage to hold their hopes in the tournament, ended up losing to the winner Pakistan, the team that had lost to India in the warm up match. But the Indian team had their own reasons for failing up to the expectations.

Ravindra Jadeja had a brilliant IPL 2, and was the top gun who took Rajasthan Royals far in the tournament. He scored brilliantly and showed positive attitude. He completed the second season with a strike rate of 116, so why would not Dhoni bat him first in the absence of Sehwag? Team India had problems shifting the batting orders of the players, and this made an impact on their performances. Kirsten and Dhoni failed here, their agenda of making everyone capable of playing at any order did not work out successfully. A few more bad decisions cost Dhoni the cup and the pride after a long successful run.

Though the unfit players were cleared by the BCCI, Sehwag’s pulling out was the indication of excess of cricket. Zaheer was not in the best of his fitness, and so was Ishant, lacking the rhythm. A team cannot bank on the performance of some of the top players, captain’s poor form with the bat and miscarried strategies, together made India lose, though they were minor shortfalls.

It was a shortcoming as a whole, no individual can be blamed. Of course Dhoni made some blunders with some of his decisions; but it will not be fair enough to scorn the team which was the winner last time and had won tournaments in New Zealand and Australia after decades.

Success spans are never eternal; they have their own lifetime. Australia was able to carry their success spans for long. But the same cannot be expected form the Indian team. A lot needs to be achieved to reach to that level. So why do we expect so much? The defeat must be accepted; we have a lot more coming under Dhoni.

India’s performance in the World Cup cannot be stated poor; it was just a bad phase where the team failed to perform at certain moments. Dhoni’s gentlemen gesture by accepting the defeat and then getting back to the basics are the qualities, which attract the support and praise of the entire cricket community. In a way he has won the hearts of many people with this.

All-vengeance is what can be expected from the captain cool. He will bounce back hard on the opponents and predictions have already taken place.

It’s not just the matter of playing the inexperienced at the top; results would have been completely different if Jadeja had scored another 5-10 odd runs against England.

It needs courage to take such decisions, there were very few who stood with the captain, who has given tremendous success and had shown promising future of the Indian cricket in the absence of the fabulous four.

Indian cricket has a bright future under Dhoni and the presence of Sehwag and Yuvraj will surely provide the young legs to stand tall.

At the same time, it is depressing to see the media hailing Dhoni at the best possible manner after every success and now asking for his resignation after the defeat. We must grow up to learn our responsibilities and to report understanding the situations.