The Indian cricketing segment has seen too much change in the last couple of months, which has led to a break in India’s unbeaten streak. The Indian team lost the second ODI against New Zealand as Daryl Mitchell again proved his ability and snatched the match from India’s hands. India made a forced change in the match, and Nitish Reddy finally got some time as he replaced Sundar, who was ruled out of the whole series due to a leg injury.
New Zealand, this time, toured India with an inexperienced side, while India is almost playing with their A side; still, they managed to shock the home team with a commanding 7-wicket victory. They scored the required runs before 2.3 overs while chasing 285 runs. For India, only KL Rahul went big by smashing a commendable 112 runs, and Indian bowlers remained unable to find a way to take wickets in the middle overs, so India faced a defeat on home soil again.
Overthinking or mismanagement?
India’s fortresses are becoming weaker day by day; collective problems are responsible for that. In the last couple of months, India has seen too many changes, which were tagged as ‘part of transition’, but what has backfired is that too many thoughts sometimes overpowered the situation, and it seems the new environment, which has never been there in the Indian dressing room, has led to mismanagement also as the Indian team management has now adopted a different type of structure where T20I players and long-format players are treated differently. Also, fitness management evolved as an issue for the team India, which has reduced the players' availability.
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Fitness management in birds eye view
The Indian team management has to choose different players for different setups, and for that, injury-prone players like Bumrah and Hardik have to sit out of the team whenever an ODI is played. The management has tried to change too many things at once, which is a part of the problem; the bigger question should be raised about selections. As no one has got the stability that any player should get. From Nitish Kumar Reddy to Rishabh Pant, no one has clarity on their roles. On Wednesday, when New Zealand was batting and scoring the runs easily, no bowler stood out in the difficult situation. Prasidh Krishna is playing in place of Arshdeep Singh and leaking runs, while Jadeja is not doing anything special. How the management is assessing things is something to think about.
