JOIN US“Of course quite a few players will get fit and they will be back in the ODI squad,” pointed out Dhoni replying to the question if his team would be in a much better position to challenge the English side in familiar conditions.
“That means we may not be good as good a fielding side as we are right now. May be that’s an issue but not to forget in India most of the grounds are small where there is not much opportunity for the batsmen to take twos and threes. So I think it (fielding) will be fairly good,” skipper Dhoni explained after India settled for tie in the fourth ODI here at Lord’s.
While maintaining that the younger brigade deserved an extended run, Dhoni said it would be difficult to accommodate them if senior players are fit.
“Well, I suppose everybody should be considered and retained but you have to see who are all available,” he began. “It becomes a bit difficult as you know there are quite a few senior players who are missing in this series. I think they always get an upper hand. It’s tough for youngsters but they are in a good grooming period. We all know once their time comes, they will be there for next five-10 years,” he offered.
The rain interruptions failed to provide a decisive result despite half hour extension but Dhoni wasn’t in favour of stretching the game any further.
“It was supposed to be a day game,” said Dhoni when asked if there should be a guideline to extend the game if flood lights are available. “I think once it’s a day game, you have different guidelines or principles that need to be followed. Just for the sake of getting a result, if you push it to day-night game it won’t really look nice. Imagine if you start a game at 8.30 am in Guwahati and if you have lights and if gets extended to 8.30 in the night, it will be very difficult for the cricketers. Whatever guidelines were there were followed (on Sunday). If we had got the result in our favour we wouldn’t have said anything about it,” he elaborated.