Dhoni and India must stop worrying and start planning

In the 2009 T20 Cricket World Cup, the defending champions India have put themselves in a spot of bother. They now need to win both their remaining matches in the Super Eights round against England and South Africa in order to keep their hopes alive. They could have easily averted this Do-or-Die situation if they had just PLANNED properly. Their captain, Dhoni, now-a-days seems to have an identity crisis. First, he gets the batting order horribly wrong, and then sends himself higher up the order, plays 23 balls and scores just 11 runs. Maybe he never realized that in the World of Twenty Twenty Cricket, even a strike-rate of 100-110 is just considered as average. Pardon me for saying this DHONI, T20 does not allow the slow pokes to survive. It’s time Dhoni switches back to his old style of hitting and stop pretending to play the sheet anchor role. In England, the par score is 170, so if India do bat first, they should have scored atleast 170-185 against WI, they failed to do and they lost. What Dhoni needs to do now is to learn from his past mistakes and mend them.

What Dhoni needs to do?
In order to win the remaining matches and then win the World cup, Dhoni has to first plan. You cannot enter a T20 match without a strategy. By seeing India’s recent performances, I can clearly say that India have never planned a clear strategy. Dhoni should stop relying heavily on his INSTINCTS and LUCK. India have a powerful batting order. All Dhoni needs to do is to allow the in-form batsmen such as Rohit, Raina, and Yusuf to have a go at the bowlers. Gambhir should be asked to play the Sheet anchor role and score at atleast a run-a-ball. Dhoni should drop himself to no 5 or 6. If India do lose early wickets, it makes no sense to play defensively. The logic is simple. You either go slam bang and make 160-170 allout rather than end up at 145-150. If India desire to win, their best batsmen need to face the majority of the overs, not an out of form DHONI.

The next thing Dhoni needs to address is the pathetic performance of his bowlers during the slog overs. It’s a pity that even inspite of having World Class Bowlers, we still manage to leak atleast 10-12 runs per over in the slog overs. India must tighten their bowling or just pack their bags and prepare to leave. The seniors Harbhajan and Zaheer need to take up the responsibility of taking crucial wickets and containing the opponents.

India must have a strategy for every individual opponent. They must ensure that they adapt themselves to counter the opponent’s strengths and exploit their weaknesses perfectly. For instance, England and South Africa are not very good players of spin bowling. So in this case, India should use their full time and part time spinners effectively and try to contain their opponents to a score of 150-160. While batting against their opponents, Indians must try to prevent the main bowlers in the opposition from taking wickets. If India can plan an effective strategy and execute it, then we are sure to be T20 World Cup champions again. As of now, let us keep our fingers crossed and pray that Dhoni and his team play sensible cricket and win.