Prowess, calmness and clutch, but... Is it time India drop Ajinkya Rahane?

(contd.) Pujara and Rahane again today! I think this is enough. They have had too many chances now. Whether they deserved or not is a different topic. But these two should make way now for Mayank and Vihari. A 50 can't be an excuse for the next 5 games because the purpose is lost by then. So from my earlier comment the top 6 for the next game should be Rahul, Rohit, Mayank, Virat, Vihari and Pant. Whether India wants to go 4 bowlers or 5 bowlers, Ashwin has to play in the spinners slot ahead of Jaddu. Saying Jaddu's batting is an advantage is a myth we are made to believe. If batting is what is needed India can go with an additional batsman. The only choice where Ashwin should be dropped is if the team wants to have 4 bowlers and all pace attack. If its 1 spinner 4 pacers or 1 spinner 3 pacers or 2 spinners 3 pacers, whichever way Ash should fit in first. Now that India is on a 1 spinner 4 pacers plan, Ashwin plays at 7 ahead of Jaddu. Spin conditions and both would play but for now Ash should take the priority. The 4 pacers. My first two pick would be Shami and Umesh; so far to say that I would pick them ahead of Bumrah too. Shami and Umesh are too good for red ball game to be left out. I am okay with them being left out in both 50 and 20 over formats so as to manage their workloads but they should be the first pick in tests. Bumrah and Thakur (slots in at 8) the other two pacers. Yes I have been lil harsh on Siraj but for now he plays when one of the other 4 is being rested. Shreyas Iyer, Manish Pandey, Devdutt Padikkal, Sheldon Jackson and few others have to be brought into the loop. Some of them may miss out on the 11 or miss out on the squad itself but they should be communicated regularly how far or how close they are to making it into the 11. I feel the biggest wrongdoing on the part of selectors in the last decade or so has been the communication or the lack of it. If S.Badrinath couldn't make it to the team, it was understandable. He played in an era where Dravid, VVS, Sach were too good to be played ahead of; and they were consistently good. But if someone like Manish or Sheldon questioned their exclusion, what answers can we come up with? Can we really put our hands on our heart and say the players selected have been consistently performing? Like the topic of this article and the stats in it, a player playing purely as a batter with an average of 40! Nope. There is something wrong. Coming outside the playing 11 or the combinations, there are two changes that India has to make and the selectors and the board have to be brave on this. Removing Virat from captaincy and looking beyond Ravi for the coach. As a huge Indian cricket fan, I have nothing but huge admiration for Virat and what he has done for the team. The games he has won for the team is nothing short of spectacle. Let me go back a lil to pre-Kohli captaincy. Dhoni - the master. Dhoni's captaincy style was/is more suited to shorter formats. He is the kind of captain if opposition gives a lil space, he would squeeze and squeeze and take the match under his control. His calm demeanor meant that more often than not the opposition would give in to their emotions and Dhoni would grab it. This style I feel won't suit the longer format. But he did have a great success in his first few years in tests. How? A large part of the credit has to go the senior group then. The top 5 of Viru Gauti Dravid Sach and Laxy was a cushioning that any captain can dream of. And they played consistently as a group. And India generally had atleast 2 amazing spinners in their ranks at any point of time. With Zak playing in his peak, Dhoni had the huge advantage of letting the players do what they want, just tweak with 1 position at best and the results were great. That is why once the seniors retired, Dhoni's style did not work in the tests. A Michael Clarke could build a new team to the top but Dhoni could not. Once the seniors retired I knew Dhoni's captaincy would fail in tests and a new energy was required. I feel Virat should have been handed captaincy few years earlier itself, atleast in tests. Is Kohli a bad captain? Not really. And he was the one India needed in tests at that point. India needed some aggression in tests and there he was. The test format does need a lot of enthusiasm as the game will have a lot of low energy periods and Virat's style suits the format. There are two big contributions on his part, in his captaincy. One, the fitness levels to bring it to the world standard. Two, bringing the fast bowlers to the foreground where they can compete against the best in the world. Once we achieved these two, Kohli's captaincy touched the saturation point. He is not a master technician, which is clearly visible in shorter formats and big ticket tournaments. I think the time has come to pass on the baton to the next brain. He should give up captaincy and start being the run machine he was. I genuinely believe he will win more games with the bat than with his captaincy. Also, his way of being and running the one man show is detrimental to a team sport. Maybe it worked for a while but it won't sustain in the long run. The head coach. The superstar culture in our country means the head coach has to be a big name. Not necessarily in the face type of person. But a man with big credentials. And a good thinking brain. I really feel Kumble was the best option we had. Sadly we let him go. Past is past. The best suited now according to me is Jason Gillespie or Matthew Hayden or Mahela Jayawardene. With Hayden working for Cricket Australia, BCCI should go in for Gillespie or Mahela at any cost. One of them as the coach with Rohit being the captain in all 3 formats for the next few years. Until we find the next captaincy material. The best captaincy I have seen in the Indian domestic cricket in the last few years are Manish Pandey and Jaydev Unadkat. Both of them surprised me with how they handled their respective teams. Unfortunately its hard for them to make it to the team, forget captaincy. So Rohit it has to be until we find the next gun.

Rahane has lost the plot.

The Jadeja Gambit Fails.

Yes. Now is the time. As much for the poor nature of many of his dismissals. Shaun Marsh/khawaja like Time for one of the many excellent younger prospects to get a go :thumbup:

India can't or rather shouldn't make mass changes because that sends the wrong signals to the team and also tells England that India is wobbly mentally. "I feel Pant shouldn’t be in the category as he clearly shouldn’t be responsible for scoring the runs". I'm sorry, but if Pant bats at 6, which is where Steve Waugh batted, for example, he absolutely is responsible for scoring runs. Even at 7, I'd expect a keeper to make at least 20 or 30 most times he bats. Pujara needs a reality check. His position at number 3 is probably the most critical in the lineup because he can dictate how an innings plays out. He also has to realise the guys below him are in average to poor form, so it's even more important he bats with intent. As you said, he did that on day 3 in the last Test but in all but one of his previous 20 or 30 knocks, he's simply batted slowly, supposedly providing the foundation for the rest of the lineup to make runs. It simply doesn't work when no one else is scoring. I hope you decide to write some more pieces, Priayanshu. I enjoyed this article and your subsequent comments.

The problem is the entire middle order. The 3,4,5 contributions in the last few years is really bad. I used to tell my cricket friends that there are many things that are wrong in our present system and that some of the wins are masking them. We need to see our flaws whether we are winning or losing. With the current way of things in Indian cricket, I don't see India becoming the Windies of 70s and 80s or the Aussies of 90s and 00s. One team that is actually progressing continuously is New Zealand and not India as many people think. India could have become a dominating power with all the talent that we have. IPL showed us so many new faces. But it's not just IPL. The last decade or so of the domestic structure has been amazing. Sadly we are not able to bring it to the International level. Blame it on the team management or the captains or the coaches but few people really need to accept it. Let's start it with the middle order. In all fairness I believe Vihari should be playing at no. 5 now. Rewind a lil and I genuinely believe Manish Pandey should have played a lot in that position. His game is more suited to the longer format but he is shown to people as a T20 specialist. Look at his numbers; 50+ average in first class and close to 50 in List A but made to play occasionally in shorter formats. I don't think anyone in the current setup has a clue of what his role is. I would have played Rohit at no. 3 on his test return and not as an opener. His first class has all been a fine middle order bastman but made to open now. Opening in white ball and red ball are two different things. It's unnecessary pressure on Rohit now. I would open with Rahul and Mayank; Rohit, Virat and Vihari to follow. Since Rohit has made a mark now as an opener, I don't see that change now. So Mayank plays at 3. And its okay too. The game has evolved very much now. No. 3 now is not a position to block but a chance to take the game on. See Root when he played at 3, Labuschagne or Smith. Or Ponting from the previous gen, they all took it as a position to attack and take the match forward. Dravid's style was awesome for India because India never had a solid opening pair until we saw Sehwag and Gambhir. In my opinion Rahul Dravid opened the Indian innings at no. 3. So Pujara's style of play doesn't suit how the game is being played or how it should be played now. Next comes no. 6. The guy who really deserves (atleast few games to see where he stands) is Sheldon Jackson. Pant and Samson can be backup until they find some consistency in longer format. (to be contd.)

All runs scored by India in the second innings at Leeds were completely meaningless, as were all scored by England in their first innings once the (England) total moved beyond 250.

Great to see another cricket fan making a contribution we can all enjoy. This is a good first piece, Priyanshu and it's interesting you've run you're eye over the Indian lineup and singled out Rahane. Is it time India drop Ajinkya Rahane? Yes, but........ 1) who does India choose as a replacement when this series is tied up at 1-1. I read another excellent comment on a different article where the author said that India have only blooded 5 new Test batsmen over the past 7 years under Kohli and none are in the current XI. Granted Gill is injured, but that doesn't leave many options at such an important time. 2) why drop Rahane and not Pujara? Your stats are certainly compelling to drop Rahane but Pujara is the one who looks badly out of form to me and has done for the past 12 months. He still has enough class to make the occasional score and his technique makes him hard to dismiss, but he's not really helping the Indian lower order by batting so slowly, especially when Kohli, Rahane and Pant are all struggling.