With team India in red hot form right now, many people have named them the early favourites for the World Cup next year, as Kohli’s men look well equipped to lift the big trophy in England.
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Their recent 5-1 success over South Africa has spread quickly around the world, as everyone has raved at their domination of the Proteas.
Coach Ravi Shastri though feels that India has a lot work left to do ahead of the world cup, and will need to improve on a few areas.
“We’re far from ready. This is a great win. But there’s a lot of work to do over the next few months.”
“It’s an area that requires work to be done. The top-order has batted beautifully and our bowlers were phenomenal but the fifth, sixth and the seventh slot in the batting order needs to be worked upon. Once we’re done with this series, we’ll have to sit down and weigh all options once again very carefully,” he said about India’s faltering middle order.
“I’ll be the first to admit our middle-order batting has looked ordinary. We failed to convert good starts into big totals. So, there are factors we’re looking at. At the same time, there are players back in India who’ve been doing well in domestic cricket. Over the last six months, we had conveyed (to those who are potential India caps) what the team will be looking at, in terms of skills, fitness, challenges etc. Once this tour concludes, it’ll be time to revisit those conversations,” Shastri added.
“(Yuzvendra) Chahal and (Kuldeep) Yadav have been brilliant and Boom (Jasprit Bumrah), what can I say about him. It’s been a fantastic effort. As I said, we’ll sit and go through all of this once we’re done here. The most important bit? Look at the middle-order. If we can work on that and improve, there’s no stopping this Indian team.”
