India are the defending champions after a sparkling win over Sri Lanka in the final in Mumbai in 2011. Only four members of that squad have made the cut for this edition. In this episode of CONTENDERS, former South Africa captain Graeme Smith and former India captain Rahul Dravid reflect on India’s chances going into this tournament. How will they handle the pressure of being defending champions? Do they have the right personnel for the conditions in Australia and New Zealand? And can MS Dhoni join Clive Lloyd and Ricky Ponting as the only captains in history to successfully defend a World Cup?
What they said about…
The challenge of defending a World Cup
Dravid: As their Test form has actually nosedived, the one-day form has actually gone up. That’s why they find themselves at number two in the table. Even though they might not have the experience of some of the players from last time, I think they’ve got enough experience in the one-day side.
Smith: I think the challenge is for them to get the guys around the key players performing well in this tournament. Get them scoring runs and hopefully give their bowlers an opportunity to defend.
India’s death-bowling issues
Dravid: Mohammad Shami we’ve seen has a good yorker, and when he’s on song he does well. Ishant Sharma has blown hot and cold in one-day cricket. Bhuvneshwar Kumar is brilliant when the balls swings, but again his death bowling has been good on some days, not been great [on other days]; same with Umesh Yadav. So there’s no consistency in that.
Smith: India have proven that they can make this style of play a success. They know and they’ve got a hope that in the conditions in Australia, their seamers actually perform at a higher level.
The first game against Pakistan
Dravid: I guess they feel they play under an equal amount of pressure in terms of what the expectations are for the Pakistani team as well but maybe it’s just that the Indian players are just used to it a little bit more because of the sheer number of people supporting India.
Smith: I think India is also so used to playing under pressure, you guys play under a huge amount of expectations throughout your career and that probably benefits you in these types of tournaments.
MS Dhoni as captain
Dravid: He just gets the one-day game in terms of having to make instinctive choices. I think one-day cricket suits him because he doesn’t have to plan long term.
Smith: I think he will always perform well in this tournament and he will lead by example. I think that the keys and strengths in his leadership style, he doesn’t have to prepare too much in one-day cricket.
Virat Kohli’s role
Dravid: He will need to bat well. He’ll need to set the tempo for the side. If you look at the Indian batting lineup, they are in a sense heavily reliant on someone like Virat Kohli to get India through those middle overs which allows the likes of Raina and Dhoni to come at the back end and finish off games.
Smith: I think he is an outstanding player, he is a great player of spin and pace, that’s a huge advantage for him, and once he gets in, he has a great conversion rate. He makes it count.
India’s strength in chases
Dravid: They do it well, and I think if you look at their top seven, the expected top seven to play, they’ve got four right-hand batsmen and three left-hand batsmen in that, Dhawan, Raina and Jadeja in the top seven. So it allows them a lot of time to see through the middle overs because they’re always batting left-right, left-right combination which is never easy for sides to play against them.
Smith: They’ve also got used to chasing big totals because of their bowling attack, they’re often having to set a total slightly higher or chase a much larger total, their batters understand that and have come to terms with that and have got the confidence.