5 Indian captains and biggest blemishes on their records
Captaincy in cricket requires a precise concoction of patience, self-belief and tenacity. Leading the hopes of more than a billion people can often appear to be a poisoned chalice. While success breeds palpable euphoria from the cricket-crazy Indian population, failures are met with contempt and fury.
Extra Cover: 5 Indian captains whose captaincy tenures had abrupt endings
India have produced plenty of outstanding leaders whose inspirational and gallant captaincy resulted in numerous memorable victories. However, even those eminent skippers have found themselves enduring some extremely exasperating moments.
In chronological order, here are five Indian captains and the biggest blemishes on their otherwise illustrious records across formats.
#5 Kapil Dev and India's only home ODI series whitewash (1983)
Including the recently completed 5-match series against Australia, India have played 54 ODI series on home soil. This excludes multi-team tournaments and a minimum of two matches constitute a series. Out of all those bilateral assignments, the Indian team has been whitewashed only once in their own backward. Under Kapil Dev's captaincy, the ignominious defeat came against the then intimidating West Indies team in 1983.
Fresh off a game-changing World Cup triumph, India were playing host to Clive Lloyd's rampaging West Indies unit. Out to prove a point regarding their ODI reputation, the Caribbean troops clean swept the reigning World Champions by a massive 5-0 margin. Opener Gordon Greenidge put the Indian bowlers to the sword by smashing 353 runs at an average of 88.25 with one century and two fifties. Having led his country to its maiden World Cup glory, Kapil is rightly regarded as one of India's greatest ever captains. But this landslide series defeat was a major blot on his ODI captaincy record.