How important are the ICC Events for any cricket team playing at the international stage? If you want to know the answer, ask any English Fan. He or she might be able to explain the different feelings and emotions which they went through on July 14, 2019.
The ICC Events, be it The World Cup or The Champions Trophy or The T20 World Cup sets its platform every 4 years. It gives every team a chance to enrich their trophy cabinets and become the champions of world cricket. For a country like India wherein Cricket is nothing less than a religion and people expect a lot from their players, an ICC Event is a festival.
With so much hype created, the players start to feel the pressure even before stepping on the cricket field. For a Cricket crazy nation like India where cricketers have been given the status of god and are next only to maybe a bunch of politicians and film stars, the pressure is felt a bit more. In recent times, The Indian Cricket Team has always started as the favourites of any ICC tournament. Undoubtedly, we play excellent cricket between two world cups and make the fans' expectations go beyond the sky limit.
(Source : The Wall Street Journal)
India won the World Cup after 28 years in 2011. It was for the first time that a team had won a world cup on their home soil. We even won the Champions Trophy in 2013. But things suddenly changed after the event. It has been 7 years since then and we have not won a single trophy.
We have not only played two 50 overs World Cup Semi-Final but even a T20 World Cup Final along with a Champions Trophy Final and a T20 World Cup Semi-Final. We have reached the knockout stages of every tournament since 2013 but failed either at the last shot or a step before.
Talking about Women's Cricket. We have lost three knock out games with two of them being finals. One each in both limited overs formats of the game.
The Indian Cricket Team is not able to deliver their best at the knockout stages of the tournament. There might be certain problems which need to be fixed as soon as possible.
(Source : Cricbuzz)
Talking about the Men's Team. We got a couple of problems.
1. The fall of the Top Order in Big Games. The Indian Cricket Team is a lot dependent on their first three. Shikhar Dhawan, Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli are players who can win you games single handedly. They do the same throughout the tournament which makes the middle order unexposed. The team gets a lot dependent on them and if there is a collapse no one is there to deal with it.
Virat Kohli has just managed to score 7 runs in three knockout games in the 50 overs format since 2015 (excluding two Bangladesh games). He has been absolutely magnificent throughout the rest of the tournament and been the backbone of the team. Similar is the case with Rohit Sharma. Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma are two of the finest batsmen in world cricket right now. Delivering at the big stage will still be one of the boxes which needs to be ticked in their career.
The Middle Order needs to be rebuilt and with the likes of KL Rahul, Shreyas Iyer, Manish Pandey and Hardik Pandya I see a brighter future.
(Source : NDTV)
2. The bowling has also been a concern in the big games for the team. Scores above 300 are never easy to chase and with pressure of a knockout game makes it tougher. Giving too many extras and some lack of quality bowling has let the team to suffer. We need to be disciplined with the bowl and offer a great fight in order to reduce the pressure on our batsmen.
The pressure mounts on the Indian Team which they are not able to handle at that very moment. India should take positives from the fans' support and expectations and perform to their best. By overcoming certain fears and getting the problems resolved we can be a better side. There is one difference being a good team and great team, for example take the Kangaroos of late 90s and early 2000s or the Caribbeans during the 70s and early 80s. We might be a great team but the empty trophy cabinet will always make it look like a good one.
As an Indian Fan, I would love to see India lift as many trophies as possible. What makes me more excited is that 2020 is a World Cup year (T20I) and Kohli & Co. are ready to roar once again.
- Kshitij
Had a great time reading that review on the Indian Cricket team! Sounds like we could turn out to be magnificent and unbeatable if the above suggestions are taken into consideration 👍🏻
ReplyDeleteWhat are your views on the cancellation of various matcjem like India vs. South Africa and IPL... Will postponing or cancelling them affect the performance and morale of the Indian cricketers or of the players at large....
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