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India vs Bangladesh: Dhoni returns, as focus switches to ODIs after rain-hit Test

June 18, 2015

Mirpur, Jun 18: It will be a fresh beginning for a full-strength India in limited overs cricket after the World Cup semifinal exit as they face a buoyant Bangladesh, who have more to gain then their famed neighbours, in the three-match ODI series starting on 18 June.

dhoni

Captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni is back at the helm, along with six other ODI specialists to take on a side that made the cricket world sit up and take notice by reaching the 2015 World Cup quarterfinals, where they were knocked out by an in-form Indian side.

The series is a platform for the hosts to exact revenge for the World Cup defeat, which had turned ugly after the then ICC President Mustafa Kamal of Bangladesh accused the umpires of favouring India.

As far as the Indian team is concerned, even a 3-0 result against the hosts will not be enough for the second-placed side to claim the number one spot in the ICC rankings, while a favourable outcome for the home team will boost its qualifying chances for the 2017 Champions Trophy.

Besides an opportunity to erase the memories of the World quarterfinal debacle Down Under, the prospect of earning a Champions Trophy berth will be motivation enough for the Tigers to roar.

Arriving with their main team, India have given enough indication of, in Suresh Raina's words, "how important a series this is for us".

From the Indian squad's point of view, this series is a far cry from the one that played against the same opponents in June last year. Back then, eight first-choice players were rested for a three-ODI tour and seven of them are part of this one.

The seven players - Dhoni, Virat Kohli, Shikhar Dhawan, Rohit Sharma, Ravichandran Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja and Bhuvneshwar Kumar - were seen in the nets at the academy ground of the Shere Bangla National Stadium ahead of the first game.

Asked if the series holds significance, Raina said, "Yes definitely. You saw that after the IPL, the full Test team came and now the full ODI team has come.

"Bangladesh have done well in ODIs recently, and this shows how important a series this is for us. We have done well in ODIs recently, and we are looking forward to it."

The Uttar Pradesh left-hander will be one of the mainstays of Indian batting's middle-order alongside his captain Dhoni and Kohli.

Shikhar Dhawan and Rohit Sharma automatically fill in the openers' slot with the consistent Ajinkya Rahane beefing up the top-order. The all-rounder's slot could go to Ravindra Jadeja while Umesh Yadav, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Ashwin and Mohit Sharma are expected to form the bowling attack.

The team management might also explore the options of trying out Stuart Binny or Dhawal Kulkarni in at least one of the games.

While the numero uno spot is beyond reach, Dhoni's side can reduce leader Australia's advantage to 10 points should it sweep the series three-nil. In that scenario, Bangladesh will slip to ninth position on 96 points. If India win the series 2-1, they will remain on 117 points, while a 2-1 loss will place them alongsgide New Zealand on 115 points.

Considering the improvements Bangladesh made in ODIs in recent times, India cannot afford to take their opponents for granted.

The Tigers have whitewashed Zimbabwe and Pakistan and appear a very settled unit in 50-over format.

Fast bowler Taskin Ahmed, who celebrated his ODI debut by running through India's batting order with figures of five for 28, will be keep to produce a similar effort. He took three for 69 in that World Cup quarter-final defeat.

Besides, they have the likes of Mashrafe Mortaza and Tamim Iqbal, who have been consistent performers for the side, and all-rounder Shakib Al Hasan.

Mushfiqur Rahim is Bangladesh's highest-ranked batsman in the ICC rankings at 18th position, and he will also look to shoulder some of the batting responsibility, provided he recovers from his finger injury. Otherwise, it will be the uncapped Litton Das, who will be asked to keep wickets.

The 25-year-old Rubel Hossain, who was the star performer in the team's famous World Cup win over England with a two-wicket burst, is also in the fray.

India: ODI squad: MS Dhoni (captain), Rohit Sharma, Ajinkya Rahane, Shikhar Dhawan, Virat Kohli, Suresh Raina, Ambati Rayudu, R Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja, Axar Patel, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Umesh Yadav, Mohit Sharma, Stuart Binny, Dhawal Kulkarni.

Bangladesh: Mashrafe Mortaza (captain), Tamim Iqbal, Soumya Sarkar, Mominul Haque, Mushfiqur Rahim, Shakib Al Hasan, Sabbir Rahman, Nasir Hossain, Arafat Sunny, Taskin Ahmed, Rubel Hossain, Rony Talukdar, Mustafizur Rahman, Litton Das.

Match starts at 2.30 pm (IST).

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News Network
July 1,2020

New Delhi, Jul 1: After being named as India's 'Most Valuable Player' in Test cricket in the 21st century, all-rounder Ravindra Jadeja on Wednesday said that he will always aim to give his best for the country.

His remark came as Jadeja achieved an MVP rating of 97.3 and as a result, he was also rated as the second most valuable player Test player worldwide, only second to Sri Lanka's Muttiah Muralitharan.

"Thank you Wisden India for naming me the 'Most Valuable Player'. I would like to thank all my teammates, coaches, fans, and well-wishers for your support as I aim to give my best for our country. Jai Hind," Jadeja tweeted.

Based on CricViz's market-leading analytics, each player in world cricket was awarded an 'MVP rating' by Wisden using a statistical model to rank their 'match impact' compared to their peers.

Jadeja has played in 49 Tests from 2012, managing to score 1,869 runs and has also picked up 213 wickets.

"It might come as a surprise to see Ravindra Jadeja, India's spin-bowling all-rounder, feature as India's number one. After all, he's not even always an automatic pick in their Test team. However, when he does play he is picked as a frontline bowler and has batted as high as No.6 - contributing to a very high match involvement," the official website of Wisden quoted CricViz's Freddie Wilde as saying.

"But Jadeja's position is based on more than simply volume: it's what he does when he's involved that really counts. The 31-year-old's bowling average of 24.62 is better than Shane Warne's and his batting average of 35.26 is better than Shane Watson's. His batting and bowling average differential of 10.62 runs is the second-best of any player this century to have scored more than 1,000 runs and taken 150 wickets. He is an all-rounder of the very highest quality," he added.

With the bat in hand, Jadeja has managed to score one century and 14 fifties in the longest format of the game.

He was last seen in action during India's two-Test series against New Zealand earlier this year.

He would have been in action for the Chennai Super Kings (CSK) in the IPL had the tournament commenced from March 29.

However, the IPL has been postponed indefinitely due to the coronavirus pandemic.

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Agencies
July 28,2020

New Delhi, Jul 28: 'Your character stood out for me than the number of runs you scored," said India skipper Virat Kohli while explaining his decision to give opening Mayank Agarwal a Test debut in the 2018-19 Australia series.

Mayank Agarwal had made his Test debut against Australia in the third Test of the four-match series.

Playing the third Test at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, Agarwal managed to register a half-century in his very first innings in the longest format.

"I had seen you play for RCB, even then you played international bowlers with conviction and you would take them on. You were performing in first-class matches in a dominating way. That is something always stood out with you, I would say your character stood out for me than the number of runs. I knew you would be fearless without having any baggage," Kohli told Mayank Agarwal in a video posted on the official website of BCCI.

In the longest format of the game, Agarwal has managed to score 974 runs from 11 matches at an average of 57.29 with three centuries as an opening batsman.

The Indian skipper also explained as to what makes him notice in a player and added that it is important that guys in the team look to face new challenges and emerge triumphantly.

"For me, the biggest marker is how a person approaches the game, so for example when you opened and we made Vihari open with you. The first opportunity we presented Vihari to open the batting, he said yes to it and that matters me to the most," Kohli said.

"I opened in my first series for India, I said yes to this opportunity and things worked out fine for me. So, a guy who wants to get into tough situations will come out either holding his head high or learning from his mistakes," he added.

Kohli and Mayank would soon be seen in action for Royal Challengers Bangalore and Kings XI Punjab respectively in the Indian Premier League (IPL) starting from September 19 in the UAE.

The comparisons between Kohli and Sachin Tendulkar keep on growing and many have picked the current Indian skipper to break the records set by Tendulkar.

Tendulkar called time on his career after registering 100 international centuries, while Kohli currently has 70 centuries across all formats.

At present, Kohli is ranked at the top spot in the ICC ODI rankings while he is in the second place in Tests rankings. Kohli has so far played 86 Tests, scoring 7,240 runs with 27 centuries at an average of 53.62.

His knock of 254 against South Africa at Pune in 2019 remains his highest Test score to date. When it comes to ODIs, the current Indian skipper has played 248 matches and has 43 centuries.

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News Network
June 9,2020

Bengaluru, Jun 9: Former India skipper Rahul Dravid has said that Virat Kohli understands that the real respect for him as a cricketer will come through success in the longest format of the game.

Dravid, popularly known as 'The Wall', also said that Test batsmanship has become exciting to watch now as batters play aggressive shots more often.

"I actually believe Test batsmanship has become more exciting than before, the aggressive element of Test batsmanship is going forward, players are playing shots and it is good to see, a good thing for India is Virat Kohli really values Test cricket, he understands that the real respect for him as a cricketer will come from his success in Test cricket," Dravid told Sanjay Manjrekar in a videocast hosted by ESPNCricinfo.

He also said that defensive batting in cricket is not irrelevant, but added that players can have successful careers without having a good defensive technique.

"I don't think it is becoming irrelevant, maybe the value of defensive batting is not the same as it was a generation ago, it can never become irrelevant, I think you still need to defend your wicket if you want to score suns, I feel now you can survive without a good defensive technique in cricket," Dravid said.

"Today, you do not need to have a good Test career to have a successful career, look at the best players in the world today, a lot of them have a good defensive technique and they can play out difficult periods of the game," he added.

The 47-year-old Dravid also said that all young players want to represent their country in all three formats during their initial days, but eventually, they become realistic as time passes by.

"I would say in my interaction with the younger players, everyone's hero is someone who has succeeded in all formats of the game. I think all players start off wanting to play all formats, but then guys get a little realistic about their careers, superstars of the game will still want to play to all formats of the game," Dravid said.

Dravid is the only player in the history of cricket to be involved in two 300-plus ODI partnerships.

He played 164 Tests, 344 ODIs and one T20I for India. Dravid had announced his retirement from international cricket in March 2012.

He finished his career with 48 international centuries.

He has also coached the Indian junior sides (India U-19 and India A) and he is now the head of the National Cricket Academy (NCA).

Dravid has also led the side during his playing days and under his leadership, the side had managed to register their first Test series win in England.

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