Dinesh Kamath's Editorial 'India finds overseas tours a nightmare' that was published in Newsband

India finds overseas tours a nightmare

Indian test team finds overseas tours very difficult. In the two Tests of the current three-match series in South Africa, India lost. Skipper Kohli has to cope with a tough challenge. His 153 in the second Test was a fine but futile effort in a lost cause.

At home rivals ranging from Australia to Bangladesh were humbled. Since the last tour of Australia in the 2014-15 season, India largely played in its backyard and was never tested. The opening slots, often a merry-go-round between M. Vijay, Shikhar Dhawan and K.L. Rahul, need to be sorted out. Vice-captain Ajinkya Rahane should be replaced by Rohit Sharma.

Kohli had to constantly shuffle his squad over the last 34 Tests. India can excel in England and Australia only if the threats posed by their fast bowlers are fended off. Losing (or not winning with thumping performances) overseas has been our Achilles's heels and we know it. Our team hasn't has much exposure when it comes to playing on fast pitches. Why local pitches are made for favoring spinners, one has no idea about that. If you want your team to win overseas, then give them the condition to play that way. Isn't it simple?

It is proven again that Indian batsman are not able to play on bouncy tracks. Indians have rarely performed well as a team when playing abroad. This team is no exception. Let us not live under any illusion. Statistics have meaning only when the sampling covers all possibilities evenly. India's ranking of no 1 based mostly on performances in Indian soil is of no real significance. India is over reliant on Kohli, if you want to win a game- every player has to play quality cricket. India is badly missing a quality wicket keeper batsman. India Fielding had to be outstanding.

Actually, the team India's biggest mistake was to play with Sri Lanka at home instead of playing practice matches in South Africa. Playing with weaker team and winning against them make India an arrogant team and weaker than previous position. The result is all about that - SA leads 2-0 against INDIA.

The players joined hands to oust a legend like Kumble and got a non-Coach like Ravi Shastri. Now Ravi Shastri and the team have to prove that their decision was right. Even with a legend like Kumble at the helm the team would have found the going tough as they are touring countries where their past record is not all that great.

Truth is that we do not wish to face the reality, which is that most pitches in South Africa, Australia, New Zealand and England are normally prepared to favour their pace bowlers. Strength of the home team’s bowlers lies in their ability to exploit tailor-made conditions in their respective countries. It is also true that our batsmen are not adequately exposed to pitches which are prepared in these countries. Performance of our pace bowlers when they bowl on pitches in above mentioned countries is not as good as it should be. Our bowlers are not adequately exposed to conditions in these countries and that is why their performance is not as good as that of bowlers of rival teams. BCCI has a major role to play in this regard.

In view of excellent performance of Indian cricket team for the last couple of years, it was hoped that Virat Kohli led team would create history by winning a series in South Africa but worst fears have come true and it has instead repeated history by badly losing series yet again. So we are back to square one, unbeatable on dust bowls at home and bad losers overseas against good teams.