When Shubman Gill and Ishan Kishan raced away to a 90-run opening stand in the second ODI match, another routine win over the West Indies seemed to be on cards. India haven’t lost an ODI match against the two-time world champions in four years, and the series was expected to be done and dusted on Saturday evening itself, before the unlikeliest result occurred. Gill’s dismissal sparked a collapse which India failed to recover from, losing 10 wickets for 91 runs to set a target of 182 which was chased down by West Indies, who only earlier this month failed to qualify for the 2023 ODI World Cup.
Following the loss, angry Indian fans lashed out at team’s head coach Rahul Dravid for his strategy in the match where two of the senior batters in captain Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli were rested while the batting line-up looked in disarray as well. Sanju Samsonwho was playing his first ODI match since November 2022 and has been a batting option for India at No.5 or 6, was asked to walked in at No.3. Axar Patel was then sent at No.4, ahead of stand-in skipper Hardik Pandya while Suryakumar Yadav at No.6.
Fans of the Indian cricket team were not at all convinced at the tactic which cost them the match and fumed at Dravid while fearing a repeat of the 2007 World Cup horrors. India, led by Dravid, had incurred their worst-ever World Cup show 16 years back as they lost to Bangladesh and Sri Lanka to suffer a group-stage exit.
Here are some of the reactions…
Dravid speaks on team selection for 2nd ODI
The India legend explained that with the team still uncertain over the return of Shreyas Iyer and KL Rahul for Asia Cup, they had to make way for the back-up options to gain some game time and be match ready for the World Cup.
“Honestly, this was our last chance to try some of our players. We have got four of our players who are injured and are in the NCA. With days to go for the Asia Cup and then the World Cup, we are kind of running out of time in a lot of ways. And we are hoping that some of them will be for the Asia Cup and the World Cup but we can’t take those chances. We have to try out other people and give them chances so that in worst case scenario they at least have game time behind them,” he said.
India will play the last and final ODI match of the series on Tuesday before the tour moves forward to the T20I contest. This will hence be India’s final ODI game before Asia Cup.
