ICC Cricket World Cup 2011: Baseless World Cup Dream

The World Cup is up and running, the wait is over but something smells and seems so similar. As Ravi Shastri said during the India - England tied match, the only weakness of India is the bowling and then after a couple of seconds' gap mentioned fielding as well. Maybe another way to say this would be that India's ONLY strength is batting... and that makes us the favourites!!!!

Much has been written and praised about MS Dhoni the captain, however let's face it, most of it has to do with his personally "cool" demeanor than Dhoni the on field thinking and strategizing captain. There is no doubt that he has come up with some gems but there is also no doubt that a lot of those gems are a result of probably playing to his reputation none bigger than having Piyush Chawla in the World Cup, something no expert from Gavaskar to Ganguly (who I must add is going to be in the very near future the foremost expert commentator / columnist on cricket) could really explain with conviction. Somehow the "experts" have a way of thinking in the same way and maybe Ganguly being forced to retire may not be such a bad thing, it will be refreshing to hear Ganguly talk.

However, this is not just about our captain but also about our so called experts who it seems are little too wary of upsetting the BCCI by playing down our chances of winning the World Cup as it directly points the fingers at our selectors and most of the experts (read as Indian experts) need to be on their right side. Take for example Kris Srikanth who till date has never given a straight forward answer to his selections by playing it down with his now customary attitude of brushing everything away.

The 2 most dominant teams to have won the World Cup, be it WI under Clive Lloyd or Australia under Ricky Ponting had one thing in common, they took out the chance factor from the sport also known as the "Game of chance" and I think that will be the factor which will decide which team will dominate World cricket next. At the moment only South Africa seems to be heading there, India is certainly far from reaching that position. One of the reasons for that in my mind is that when a team has players who are affective (i.e if they have a good day) for only 10% of the match then you know you have problem, namely Munaf Patel and maybe Piyush Chawla, who can't field nor bat but only contribute during their 10 overs.

It is for this reason that I think on paper South Africa is the favourite to win this World Cup by some distance. You can be sure that they will bowl well, field exceptionally well and tear apart any bowling attack. India consistently fails in 2 out of 3 of these departments, however, I think the greatest reason coming in the way of us being world champions and dominating world cricket is our refusal to accept our weaknesses. After all how many of our batsman accept the fact that they are not good at playing the short balls?

Our batting is clicking and let us pray it keeps clicking and we keep scoring 330 plus in each match, but even the most ardent fan would agree, it's not going to happen each time and when it doesn't, can we keep hoping that the opponent has the same day in the office as Australia did in the practice match!!! Take all the matches India has played in this World Cup, be it against Australia, New Zealand, Bangladesh or England all these teams got off to a flyer and the victory had to do as much if not more with these teams' collapse at some stage or the other rather than our bowling, fielding or attitude in the middle.

However, these matches probably have happened at the best stage of the World Cup for India, we will in all probability finish in the top 2 of our group and make it to the QF's but from then on the so called "Chance" factor will have to be thrown out of the window. If we still don't change our attitude and improve our performance when we're not brandishing the willow then winning the World Cup will remain a distant dream.