Jan. 20: India are on the cusp of an unprecedented ODI series win against South Africa in South Africa having won to back-to-back games in Johannesburg and Cape Town, but Indian skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni felt the top-order batting needed to improve for India to do that.
“Our batting department, which we always say is our big strength, needs to click together as a unit,” Dhoni said on the eve of fourth one-dayer here on Thursday. “Of course the lower order has done really well, but at the end of the day it is the batsmen who will have to take the pressure. Hopefully, we will perform according to our potential tomorrow,” he said.
He added that India had been beset with injury woes, and that had meant the side playing here has many members that are not part of India’s World Cup scheme. But Dhoni felt the absence of top players had given a chance to youngsters to make use of the opportunity.
“I think both the teams are suffering from it. I am not really worried about it, but what is important is we had two close games. If you see, in the last one year we have missed quite a few big players, especially in batting department,” Dhoni said.
“The bowlers too had injuries and some were rested. So I think the team has become used to it,” the Indian skipper added. “But of course it’s good for youngsters because the conditions here are tough and if they play more matches under these conditions, they will learn more. It’s not that demanding on flat tracks, you learn to read the game well here. You have a score of 300-325 in mind in the sub-continent and all of a sudden you find that 190 can be defended,” Dhoni said.
“It’s a different aspect over here. You get lots of experience by playing such matches,” Dhoni said.