India in South Africa, 2021-22

[prasen9]

Awful batting by all the Indian batters. Kohli and Dhawan were too slow. And, Rahul and Pant were not good. This is what happens when you give people what they do not deserve. Pant does not deserve to be in the ODI team with this type of batting. Poor record batting in LOIs by Pant. He should be a test-only keeper for now.

[prasen9]

Deepak proved today benching him was poorest decision from last 1 year. Still three good prospect are waiting in form of Arsdeep, Chetan Sakariya & Avesh Khan

Deepak proved nothing. He gets wickets at 34 runs/wicket and 6.18 runs/over. Too expensive and not too much of a strike bowler. He needs to improve a lot and keep his batting form. On the other hand, PK gets wickets at 25.88 r/w and 6.65 runs/over. PK is more expensive but if someone is expensive, I want them to take wickets. DLC does neither well. I would not mind taking a look at Sakariya. But, all these young players need a proper run before they are chucked out.

Our best two bowlers in ODIs are still Bumrah and Shami.

[Rajkumar Sharma]

Deepak proved today benching him was poorest decision from last 1 year. Still three good prospect are waiting in form of Arsdeep, Chetan Sakariya & Avesh Khan

Deepak proved nothing. He gets wickets at 34 runs/wicket and 6.18 runs/over. Too expensive and not too much of a strike bowler. He needs to improve a lot and keep his batting form. On the other hand, PK gets wickets at 25.88 r/w and 6.65 runs/over. PK is more expensive but if someone is expensive, I want them to take wickets. DLC does neither well. I would not mind taking a look at Sakariya. But, all these young players need a proper run before they are chucked out.

Our best two bowlers in ODIs are still Bumrah and Shami.

Modern day odi cricket has changed after expansion of T20Is. 5/6 an over is now considered as economical, its the wicket column that matters. Its just 7th odi of Deepak, more he plays more he improves, he has got natural quality of swinging the bowl both ways as a result he takes early wickets, all that he needs to improve is bowling at middle overs and death overs. PK was hitting 145+ constantly in England series at home today he was mostly around 135 kph which is quite less, he made his name as tear away quick and proved that in flaccid tracks.

Avesh will be picked ahead as he has got good pace & swing and also know the art of bowling at the death, whereas left armers like Sakariya & Arsdeep bowls at too much less pace which is not enough to trouble batters. Sakariya & Arsdeep if improve their pace then their indippers to the right handers will look more fiery as both of them has got that skill.

Along with Bumrah, Shami, Natarajan is also there but so far it looks he has got lots of fitness issue. Haven't seen anyone to land yorker so accurately after Bumrah. Natarajan is that guy who can do it if properly groomed.

[Kumar]

To win, we need the runs. He did not score the runs. The average being low means he scored the second most runs because he got the most number of outs or more than most. The others scored more runs/innings and that is why he is 8th. Now you can make the case that he blocked out so many balls and that is why we did not lose the series. Okay, that is true. But, a replacement who would average better than him may have put us in a position to win the game and not just have to block to prevent loss. Expecting a batsman to score a zero and then showing whatever runs they scored and ignoring their low scoring innings and choosing their high scoring ones is just selective amnesia on your part. A batsman is expected to play out balls and score runs. Pujara only did the first part to an extent but largely was below par wrt the second. He was below replacement level. I would rather give the replacements chances and then move down the order and find replacements who can bat instead of keeping deadwood whose expire by date is .

Pujara partnership record in Australia- His name is involved in 3 of the top 4 partnerships in terms of runs scored. 262, 193 and 125 with Pant, Gill and Rahane across entire series.

https://stats.espncricinfo.com/ci/engin ... s;type=fow

Against England , he was involved in two partnership in top 5 (Rohit Sharma and Kohli)in terms of runs scored.only Rohit Sharma was involved in more partnership.

His keeping one end safe makes a big difference. I agree that sometimes it is frustrating when he does not score any runs. . In SA series, except for first test matCh we did not reach 100 overs a whole lot. So played second new ball just twice. Further, our players lack temperament to play test cricket and get out to nothing balls way too often. You are really undervaluing the energy that bowlers expend when they bowl that many overs . I watched pretty muchevery ball in the Australia series and Cummings had no energy at the end of that match. Pujara played out some fiery spells from both Hazelwood and Cummings.
And u can say, i am choosing last two test to make selective case. But then when u say he had the 8th best average among indian players u included Thakur, kohli , Jadeja and Sundar who just played two innings.so the sample size for this players is not enough. Further except for Kohli, none of them were invovled in that 36 innings. We can always use numbers to selectively make our case. For you, it is the average, but for me context is important as well.

[prasen9]

Nonsense. 5 runs an over is exceptional. Over 6 is mediocre to bad. For pacers. 25 runs/wickets is great. 30 is so so. 35 is mediocre to bad. DLC has been mediocre to bad with the ball.

[prasen9]

At the end of the day, Kumar, the game is won or lost by runs. They do not take the context into account or some other imaginary measure. Pujara has been bad for three years. Just see the runs he has scored/wicket.

Now, I am not saying he has not had any contribution. Of course, even the masseuse has a contribution in a win. I am saying that his contributions were not that exceptional. In that a replacement #3 would have scored that many runs or more. Or at least that we should demand that of our #3. I have high standards. We need to have high standards if we want to be #1. No point settling for mediocrity. He played a number of balls that maybe over the average one is expected to play but he scored runs significantly below what a proper batsman should score. While he was not as bad as Akash Chopra, who was hailed for dulling out the ball, that is not sustainable. A #3 has to score runs. If they cannot, chuck them out and give the rest a chance. Someone will put their hand up. We do not have to settle for these failures.

The relationship between runs scored and wins are direct. Is there any evaluation that takes balls played into account? What are India's or more generally any other team's scores when the number of balls played by the #3 is high vs low if they do not score that many runs? I doubt it will be that significant. And if someone really has to take the shine off the ball for a #4 or a #5 to score runs, then they do not deserve to be in the team either. We should get 5-6 batsmen who can score runs. In a country of 1.4 billion, we can find five if we give them the chance. We do not need to settle for subpar players. Note I am not saying Pujara has been sub-par in his career. But, he has been below par in the last three years. And, Shastri kept him or did not have the balls to overrule Kohli who kept him. That is a fact. Look up his contributions .

But, I must really tip the cap to you guys for the chicanery that you are indulging in. I never brought in Australia. You brought it up. I do not agree that someone should be dropped for a failed series, e.g., Shreyas in this series. My yardstick is that you need to give people, especially great or good players, established players 15 innings to judge if they have lost form. I did not complain about Pujara in his first year and a bit into the second of poor performance. But, beyond 15 innings, something is wrong and they need to go back to A-teams and domestics to fix things. So, you bring in the case of Australia and once you do that everything will be small sample size. Then, you want to discount Thakur, Pant, Sundar, Vihari, Ashwin, Gill, etc.'s contribution because their sample size is small. Yes, their sample size is small. So, if you want to avoid small sample sizes, take a sequence of 15 outs or more. Pujara will come out badly in the last three years if you do that. But, fantastic skulduggery folks. We will say that whoever played the most innings made the most contributions and therefore they should be kept in the team irrespective of performance because everyone else is small sample size? What about this: let's invent a new yardstick saying that having people with the last name P (and R maybe) is what helps people win tests? Shall we try that and see who contributed to our wins?

[Kumar]

We have a batting line up that is very bad. And that needs to be protected. And that is the sad truth.

I would take a Pujara that showed up in Australia every time. You loose both sydney and gabba without Pujara contribution. I guess we have to agree to disagree. on his current form, i have no issues dropping him.

DRCalmost got india thru, but then decided to take one more risk when single were the need of the day.

[Rajkumar Sharma]

Shreyas Iyer 22 odis in his name, fully is overrated.

[prasen9]

We have a batting line up that is very bad. And that needs to be protected. And that is the sad truth.

We should not accept that. We need to move on and keep trying people until we find people who can bat.

DRCalmost got india thru, but then decided to take one more risk when single were the need of the day.

The real culprit in this game is Pant. He gave RSA the opening. Also, Yadav. He did not bat like an allrounder. Why is Krunal Pandya not in the team? I understand Jadeja and Axar are hurt. Either one of those slots give us some runs and we get over the hump.

Brilliant batting by DLC. We should not look for bowlers (or batters) per se. We should look for people who can play at particular positions.

For #8, the contenders should be DLC, Thakur, Axar

For #7, it will be Jadeja, Hardik, Krunal

For #9, it should be Bumrah, and some pacers who can bat a bit.

[prasen9]

Shreyas Iyer 22 odis in his name, fully is overrated.

Has performed so far and should be given a run. On the other hand, Pant has not and should be dropped. Let Rahul keep. Or bring in Kishan.

At the end of the day, we could not recover from the absence of Jadeja, and Rohit, and Hardik due to injuries. That seriously upset the balance in the team. Why Jayant was chosen and not Krunal, I do not know. And from resting Shami.

[prasen9]

Kumar, I understand your point. I do not think that it matters that much but okay taking the shine off the ball may be useful for players down the order. But, the craziest thing I have heard on this thread is that Pujara helped take the shine off the ball for Gill. Gill opened and Pujara came at #3. Gill held his own in that series and had serious contributions including a 90 in the last inning. He did not need anyone to take the shine off the ball for him. That is just batshit crazy to claim that.

[Kumar]

We have a batting line up that is very bad. And that needs to be protected. And that is the sad truth.

We should not accept that. We need to move on and keep trying people until we find people who can bat.

Based on my IPL observations, I don’t think our batting pipeline is deep as it is made to be. I agree that Shreyas Iyer, Sarfaraz , Vihari should get opportunities. I have no problem dropping Rahane and Pujara for the upcoming series. My gut tells me that me that we may not find replacement level players easily.. we will see what happens.

Even in this dead match, we did not try Gaikwad. That really bothers me.

[ssp]

What a predictable and laughably inept ending to today's match. Chahar needed to just get singles, but went for a crazy shot. Game was over right there. Our tailenders are very consistent at being utterly useless.

Apart from 1st and last day of the 1st test we were 2nd best for the rest of the tour. Every single day was won by RSA.

A clear out is needed, but we can look forward to more of the same in all formats.

[prasen9]

I would take a Pujara that showed up in Australia every time. You loose both sydney and gabba without Pujara contribution. I guess we have to agree to disagree. on his current form, i have no issues dropping him.

Yes, we will disagree. I am not content at that contribution with the number of runs he scored. If you go scoreboard-picking, then yes, you lose those where he did contribute and scored above 50 etc. and win those matches where his replacement would have contributed. On the balance, it works out. I am not sure that we will be finding someone right away who can give even his production. But, I am willing to go low for a year or two to go high for the next 5-7 years. That is, rebuild. Shastri was not. He put up with subpar performances, imho.

Basically, we draw the line at different levels. I demand more; you are fine with that level of performance. I think we can find people who can do that or better. You think not. So, we disagree.

[prasen9]

Based on my IPL observations, I don’t think our batting pipeline is deep as it is made to be.

This is the crap I think we need to get away from. IPL cannot tell us who will be good in tests. We should use the Ranji Trophy, Duleep Trophy and most heavily A-team tours to decide that.

My gut tells me that me that we may not find replacement level players easily.. we will see what happens.

And, you know what, I think you may be right. But, we have to go through the process. Replacement players will not grow on trees. We have to give them a year or two at the international level to grow. Some will rectify their errors. Some will fall away. Take Gill. He batted pretty well for an opener in Australia. Then, a hole in his technique was exploited by people and he started getting out. We need to let him play and try to fix his technique at some point. If he does not, then we go onto the next one. While I cannot guarantee we will find replacement level players easily overseas, I think we will find Pujara-Rahane level production, i.e., about 25-30 runs on average overseas easily from some youngsters. And, if we delay the trials of the youngsters, we will give the old guard more time. I do not think they can come back to their under-30 forms. Then, we will lose a year or two of series abroad like we did in South Africa and be a few years away from discovering the successors.

Even in this dead match, we did not try Gaikwad. That really bothers me.

Precisely. What was the point in playing Kohli or Dhawan here? Or Bumrah for that matter?