Team India - End of a victorious season
The ‘Men in Blue’ are on a roll
With a clean sweep against minnows Zimbabwe, India have ended their season on a high with back-to-back victories in England,West Indies and Zimbabwe.
They played like the No.1 team in ODIs, which they are, and emerged champions in each and every tour. Lots of positives were brought forth for the team in these tours and many of the young players got to showcase their talent in front of the entire cricketing fraternity.
But the stand out performance of India was, undoubtedly, winning the last edition of the ICC Champions Trophy in England and Wales. The conditions in England have always been difficult for the team and India’s last tour to the nation had proved to be a total disaster as they lost their No.1 Test Ranking to England and were also outplayed in the shorter formats of the game.
So, winning the Champions Trophy was a big splendid achievement for our players. Having a young team with fresh and new faces, Dhoni had quite a few things to worry about at the start of the tournament and but his boys rose to the occasion and proved their credentials at the right time to win the tournament for him. The young guys adopted the conditions in England very quickly and everyone performed for the team when required.
Team India’s tri-series victory was also inspiring as they were two games down and had also lost their captain due to hamstring injury. But as always, under the stand-in captain Virat Kohli, the boys played their “A” game and won the team a place in the tri-series final which was looking very difficult in the early part of the series.
In the final against Sri Lanka, when all was lost for Team India while chasing a modest target of 202 against their Asian neighbours, regular captain M.S. Dhoni, in his comeback match, proved a match winner again. He led his team to a famous victory in the last over as he hung on to his wicket with the tail-enders and added another trophy to his cabinet.
After two difficult tours, team management decided to rest their frontline players and give some new players a chance in the much easy tour to Zimbabwe and their plan didn’t backfire as the young Team India, under Virat Kohli’s captaincy were able to whitewash the African nation 5-0 and register their first ever series whitewash on foreign soil. These tours have been positive for India and have also led to the success of many of their young players.
Emergence of Shikhar Dhawan and Rohit Sharma
These two lads were given the tough task of opening for the team in their first encounter against South Africa in the Champions Trophy, 2013. Both these players accepted their new roles as openers wholeheartedly and delivered the goods for the team when mattered the most.
They were involved in two back-to-back century stands followed by two fifty-runs partnerships to make India reach the final of the Champions Trophy. The best part of their recent success has been that both these players were making a comeback after a long time into the national side and their contribution played a vital role in each and every match for the ‘Men in Blue’.
Dhawan scored three centuries in all the tours combined, while Rohit Sharma had five fifty plus scores and enjoyed a good run while touring for Team India.