India team director Ravi Shastri believes his one-day team is a work in progress and they need not be
India’s fortunes in the 50-overs have nosedived since the 2015 World Cup semi-final loss to Australia with eight defeats and just six wins in 14 games. It also includes series defeats to Bangladesh, South Africa and now Australia.
Although India are placed No2 in the ODI rankings, they could slip to No4 if New Zealand win their upcoming ODI series against Pakistan. Shastri, however, is banking on the positives and drawing ins-piration from the Test team that lost in Australia last year before bouncing back with series victories against Sri Lanka and South Africa to rise to the No1 spot.
“I think it’s a huge learning curve. Absolutely no shame in the way they played,” Shastri said yesterday.
“I know there is only one way to go after this tour of Australia, and that is up. I know what happened 12 months ago after a Test series. And I know where we stand today as a Test team. It is a young side, there are three debutants (Birendar Sran, Rishi Dhawan, Gurkeerat Singh Mann) and we have been plagued by injures (Mohammad Shami ruled out with hamstring trouble)… I am not giving any excuses here, but it is an opportunity for the youngsters to learn.
“In Australia nothing comes easy. It’s one of the hardest places to play. You are playing against the world champions. The fact that you are competing, and they have competed right through this one-day series, is very good,” he added.
The former Indian captain wants the bowlers to use the remaining two one-dayers, today and Saturday, to improve their displays.
“We will still focus on these two one-day games. What you want to see is the bowlers learning from what has happened in the first three games. If that happens, that will be the biggest plus irrespective of the result,” he said.
Shastri also defended the batsmen who have come under scrutiny for slowing down the pace of the innings in their bid for milestones.
“If they were focusing on milestones, Virat Kohli wouldn’t have been the fastest to 7,000 runs. He would have taken another 100 games. If that was the case, Rohit Sharma would not be (scoring) two double hundreds, and a score of 264,” he said.
