India Has Tough Road to Champions Trophy

Andrew Yates/Agence France-Presse â€" Getty Images Indian captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni, left, playing during a warm-up match against Sri Lanka on Saturday ahead of the Champions Trophy in Birmingham, England.

MUMBAI â€"As India prepares for the prestigious eight-nation Champions Trophy, which starts in England on Thursday, there is much at stake for the national team, including its credibility and reputation, after the spot-fixing scandal involving three Indian Premier League players.

India’s captain, Mahendra Singh Dhoni, may have said upon landing in England that Indian cricket’s reputation hasn’t been affected by the scandal, but the reality is different.

“The spot-fixing scandal has tarnished the image of Indian cricket like never before and put the authorities in a fix,” Shirish Buch, a former Ranji Trophy player from Saurashtra, said in an interview. “Though nobody is saying it openly, one can sense that the attitude of the world towards India has suddenly changed.”

Dhoni finds himself in an unenviable position: he is expected to ensure that the world respects Indian cricket and its players by leading the national team to a solid performance in the Champions Trophy, which would also divert the attention of a cricket-mad nation from the spot-fixing scandal at home.

“Nothing less than the Champions Trophy win will do. It should do a world of good to our players and help restore some pride and prestige in Indian cricket,” Buch said.

India has titles from almost all the major international cricket tournaments - World Cup in 1983 and 2011, World Championship of Cricket in 1984 and World Twenty20 in 2007. But it has never triumphed in the Champions Trophy. The closest India came was when it reached the finals, in Kenya in 2000-01, where it lost to New Zealand, and in Sri Lanka in 2002-03, where it shared the trophy with the hosts as the final had to be abandoned because of tropical storms.

Unfortunately, India’s chances of winning the seventh Champions Trophy don’t appear all that bright. In recent times Dhoni and company have fared well only at home and against weaker teams like New Zealand and Australia. Last fall, when the true test of skills came against England in India, the home team was thoroughly exposed in batting and bowling. The Champions Trophy will be played in England, where India had performed pathetically and lost all the four tests and five One-Day Internationals in 2011.

Besides, it will not be a cakewalk for India in a strong Group B, which consists of Pakistan, South Africa and the West Indies.

Dhoni is leading a young brigade that has little experience of playing in a big tournament like Champions Trophy. The team might miss the brilliance and experience of Sachin Tendulkar, Virender Sehwag, Gautam Gambhir, Yuvraj Singh and Zaheer Khan, who all played key roles and helped Dhoni win the World Cup two years ago. While Tendulkar has retired from one-day cricket, the rest have been dropped for want of good form.

Dhoni obviously has high hopes from his young players, and he has said that he expected the all-rounder Ravindra Jadeja to play a key role in the tournament.

Andrew Yates/Agence France-Presse â€" Getty Images Virat Kohli leaving the field after scoring 144 runs during a warm-up match against Sri Lanka on Saturday in Birmingham, England.

“I don’t think absence of the seniors will be felt,” said Aunshuman Gaekwad, a former batsman and coach for the Indian national team. “If a player isn’t in good form, he has to be dropped. Youngsters like Virat Kohli, Ravindra Jadeja, Murali Vijay, Shikhar Dhawan and Bhuvneshwar Kumar are talented enough to rise to the occasion. But the selectors seem to have erred in not picking Cheteshwar Pujara. He is an outstanding batsman, who looks solid both when defending and attacking.”

Gaekwad emphasized that unlike in Twenty20 cricket, where you can rely on a couple of players to win matches, one-day cricket calls for a collective team effort. “Every player is important and he has to play a definite role,” he said. “In the end, sustained collective effort will take India far, though I won’t hazard a guess about the two finalists or the eventual winner simply because all the eight teams are balanced and strong.”