India’s upcoming matches
Saturday, July 22nd, 2006After this current break, these are the upcoming series for Indian team (taken from cricinfo):
- In August: a triangular series in Sri Lanka that also includes South Africa
- In October: ICC Champions Trophy in India
- Nov-Dec: A regular test and ODI series in South Africa
- Jan-Feb: A tentative triangular in India involving West Indies and Sri Lanka
- March-Apr: World cup 07 starts in March.
What else can fit in in this time? Between the Lanka triangular in August and Champtions Trophy in October, BCCI was trying to organize an ODI series with West Indies in some neutral place. But now Canada has refused to host that. Also the West Indies players have threatened to boycott that as there are those regularly popping disputes with their board. So India is not only considering alternative venues but also other teams, like New Zealand or even Australia - who usually don’t play such randomly organized tournaments.
West Indies instead is trying to shift the January triangular to West Indies instead of playing it in India. That could be best thing to happen for India (and also Sri Lanka) before the World Cup. Indian team will probably blow both the teams away at home. But then when they move to the caribbean it may be a very different scene - just like what happened recently on the ODI series there. Players like Dhoni, Yuvraj Singh have found it difficult to play on such slow pitches and against slow bowlers. Even Tendulkar did not play in his aggressive style in Sri Lanka in last couple of years. So it appears our batsmen haven’t been able to adjust to the pace of these wickets. So to play ODI cricket in West Indies against the two teams most suited to play on those pitches will be the best practice Indian team can have.