Yes, the West Indians played a better game. Yes, Lendl Simmons was simply too good. Yes, there was considerable dew. But keeping all these factors aside, there were a few minute points that hurt India during their seven-wicket defeat to the West Indies at the Wankhede here on Thursday...
A start too slow
Indian openers Rohit Sharma and Ajinkya Rahane probably gave a bit too much respect to the West Indies new ball bowlers, scoring only 15 runs in the first three overs. Knowing the nature of the pitch, size of the ground and the dew later on, India should have shown intent right from the start, something South Africa, England, West Indies and even Afghanistan did in their previous games at the Wankhede. The fact that South Africa's 229/4 against England in a previous game wasn't good enough should have been on the team management's minds.
"If you see the Indian brand of cricket, we take one or two overs, we see how the wicket is behaving and according to that we say 'okay, next five overs, let's look to do this. At the end of this over if we have not lost too many wickets, this is where we should be'. We always get a score that is a par-plus score. Right from the start if you think about the big-hitters and start looking at 210 as a good score, you may end up getting 160 or 170," India captain MS Dhoni said after the game.
This defensive thinking from the captain is hard to fathom, especially considering the firepower he had in his middle order: Manish Pandey, Suresh Raina and Dhoni himself. It cost the team about 10-20 runs, something that could have made a difference in the end result.
Flat track woes
The Indian bowling unit did a commendable job in the league encounters on pitches that had a bit of assistance for the bowlers. But when it came to a slightly flatter Wankhede deck, they had few answers. And this is not the first time that they have struggled on unresponsive pitches. Even in the last international game played at the Wankhede, South Africa notched up a whopping 438/4 against a hapless, clueless Indian bowling attack. Dhoni admitted that his bowlers find it harder to execute their skills on tracks like they encountered on Thursday.
"I feel we have seen that our spinners do struggle in conditions like these," Dhoni said. "Ash (Ashwin) only bowled two overs, (Ravindra) Jadeja was forced to bowl the last quota of his overs, otherwise he would have also only bowled three overs. I think the spinners had a bit of assistance but once the dew comes in it becomes difficult for them to turn the ball."
The Ashwin puzzle
Whatever the conditions, it is rather surprising to see the team's strike bowler not completing his quota of overs. What's more, it wasn't the first time Ravichandran Ashwin didn't bowl his full four overs in this tournament. Against Pakistan on a turning Kolkata wicket, Dhoni bowled only three overs of Ashwin, while in Mohali against Australia, India's premier offie was smashed around the park in his two overs.
It either shows Ashwin's frailties on pitches that don't aide turn or the captain's lack of faith in him, so much so that Ashwin wasn't even an option for Dhoni in trying to defend eight runs off the last over on Thursday.
"No, it was not in my mind (to bowl Ashwin), looking at (Andre) Russell and the big-hitters and the amount of purchase that was on offer. That was not the best time for him to bowl," Dhoni said.
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