Do Dhoni's remarks indicate an underlying apprehension?

I might be getting a bit too suspicious here but the fact is that on the eve of their departure to the West Indies for the forthcoming World Cup 2010, the Indian captain did seem very mindful of the fact that most of his team members had participated in the very demanding format of the IPL3 and that this Indian squad certainly wasn't the freshest one in terms of the participating teams at the Caribbean event. What makes me believe this is that MSD himself isn't the greatest of supporters for the theory of playing non-stop cricket.

If you look at this captaincy record, there have been instances where MSD had himself sought the permission of the BCCI to take a rest between two series-something that no other Indian captain has dared to do in the past. Further, Dhoni himself has a very suscpet back that has been troubling him for the last two seasons. Further, to maintain the balance in the team, he cannot risk taking upon another specialist keeper to resolve this issue. So, there is basically no way in which Dhoni can reduce his workload and further, some critical teammates like Ashish Nehra and Yuvraj Singh are still recuperating and are yet to hit peak fitness.

In the background of such issues, it was strange to see that Dhoni went on to explain that his team was 'fresh' at the press conference held on the eve of the team's departure and went on to explain this without much prompting from the surrounding media persons? Is he being wary of something that is bothering the team management?

Can the Indian bowlers deliver even once?

This is what the captain, MS Dhoni must be wondering after yesterday’s loss to Sri Lanka in the second match of the Dhaka Cup. Dhoni has been very vocal about the inability of his bowlers to either contain runs or take wickets. He has often been seen in the press conferences lamenting the fact that there very few occasions wherein the bowlers have won a game on their own. Yes, it is batsmen’s game but then Dhoni cannot be blamed for expecting his bowlers to deliver at least once every ten matches or so. Just take yesterday’s ODI for instance, the total of 280 wasn’t all that bad a score and though dew was an issue, the opening Indian bowlers could have rattled the Lankans by picking up a few early wickets. That is something that hasn’t happened in the last six months for the Indian team and the trend continued yesterday night. As usual, Ashish Nehra leaked runs in his opening spell and Sreesanth reminded us why he cannot be looked upon as a reliant bowler, as he had one of his many average days, yet again. To blame the batsmen for not crossing the 300-run mark is foolish considering that they too should be give some breathing space — if they didn’t hammer the living hell out of the opposition bowlers in one, occasional match, the bowlers should have taken up the responsibility.

Dhoni as the next ‘Tendulkar’??

I would like to clear-up before anyone reading this heading gets the wrong idea. I am not trying to suggest that in terms of batting greatness and his overall genius, Dhoni can takeover Tendulkar. I am simply suggesting that the time is near when Tendulkar’s presence as a part of the regular Indian team is bound to decline considerably, i.e. in the very near future. In this perspective, being perhaps the most consistent batsman in the team after
 Tendulkar and showing ample resolution to take upon the challenge in a crisis, shouldn’t Dhoni be prepared in the role of a batter-cum-captain, by freeing him from his wicket-keeping responsibilities? The reason why I say that is that no matter what experts say about cricketers doing double-edged roles today, wicket-keeping along with captaining the side and being a major wheel for the team’s middle-order performance is bound to take a toll on Dhoni at some point. Should the selectors take stock of how they plan to ensure that Tendulkar’s eventual absence in the team is compensated to some extent by having someone as reliable as Dhoni, up the order, as a specialist bastman? The point is that even if Dhoni is freed from his wicket-keeping responsibilities, the team’s balance wouldn’t suffer to a damaging effect. For starters, having Dhoni at number three would mean that more stability and tenacity would be maintained at the top. Further, some folks might recall that even as an occasional, part-time bowler Dhoni has bowled a few overs in the domestic circuit and in some test matches against Pakistan with his average speed around the 130 km/hr mark. Considering that most mainstream bowlers in the Indian squad bowl not more than 135 km/hr, this talent of Dhoni could be worked upon, essentially as a part-time contributor. With Dhoni and Yuvraj at number three and four in the batting order and their ability to share a bare minimum of eight overs among themselves, the inclusion of a specialist keeper like Dinesh Karthick would ensure that the team doesn’t lose out on either batting or bowling resources… though that is even hard to contemplate when a certain phenomenon called Sachin Tendulkar is missing from the equation.

India's almost drops the Rajkot Match...400+ is simply inadequate!!

This had to be one of the most ordinary fielding efforts by the present Indian side, under Dhoni, wherein they kept on dropping sitters and their fielding for a major part of the Lankan innings was literally, sub-standard. It will not be an exaggeration to say that they almost lost the match owing to their poor efforts in holding on to simple catches and backing-up the throws to avoid follow-ons.
What is even more strange is that good fielders like Kohli and Raina too kept on missing the ball...it appeared as if the entire squad had a sighting problem where they couldn't get themselves in line with the ball. I would say that India really haven't edged past the Lankans by achieving this Rajkot win simply because they were run ragged until the last ball, where one of India's rare, consistent bowlers in the last few months, Ashish Nehra, ensured that he bowled according to the field and somehow ensured that the batsmen weren't able to get under the ball and ease it through the off-side. What is also worrying is that India during their batting were looking content for a score of around 385, when it was plainly visible that a score of somewhere around 450 was there to get. After the 30-over mark, most of the Indian batsmen fell to careless strokes, just trying to up the run-rate needlessly, as it was already around the 8.00 runs per over mark. It was only Virat Kohli and Jadeja's sensible effort towards the last five overs that ensured that the team managed a score in excess of 400 or else, the match would have been lost even before entering the final over of the match. I can only hope that the Indian team realizes that this is not a comprehensive win by any means and that they drop the habit of taking things easy rather than dropping catches. They have been letting teams come back and steal away wins from them in the last six months or so. The Series against Australia had a semblance of being casual in the field and the series result could have been in India's favour had they shown more intensity and planned their batting in a more structured manner when chasing/setting-up scores. This old habit of just going through the motions simply because a huge score has been put-up and putting in the real effort to field the ball, only in small patches during the match has to go, if India want to become serious contenders for world championship in any format of the game...something the Aussies do very well> no matter what stage of the game it is, they seem so vigilant and enthusiastic.