Rahul Dravid, the head coach of the Indian Cricket Team, says that they want to do some experiments before going to play the Asia Cup. India lost the 2nd ODI against West Indies by 6 wickets. India won the 1st ODI. Series in now equal 1-1. The 3rd ODI will decide the winner of the series.
In the 2nd ODI, Kohli and Rohit were dropped and Hardik Pandya got the captainship. Their experiments failed as India lost the match and they were getting trolled for benching their main players.
Rahul Dravid says,
“This was the last chance we had to try out some of our players. We have got a few of our players who are injured who are in the NCA (National Cricket Academy). With a month to go until the Asia Cup, we are running out of time in a lot of ways. We are hopeful that some of the injured players will be fit for the Asia Cup and the World Cup, but we can’t take those chances.
….We have to try out other people and give other people chances so in a worst case scenario at least they have game time behind them and it gives us an opportunity to make some decisions on players. In a series like this with only two or three matches to go, playing Rohit and Virat would not have given us too many answers. With the injuries we have in the NCA and some uncertainty surrounding them, we wanted to give some of the other boys a chance so if required they can play.”
About the 2nd ODI, he added,
“We knew it was a tricky wicket and not an easy wicket to bat on and we needed to get 230 or 240 and we felt that would have been a very good and competitive score. We lost wickets in bunches after Shubman and Ishan gave us a good start. But we needed someone to bat until the end and we lost wickets in the middle and were 50 or 60 runs short.”
Regarding Asia Cup and World Cup, he says,
“We will always look at the bigger picture. At this stage of the cycle with the Asia Cup and World Cup coming up, because of the injuries we have, we have to look at the bigger picture. We can’t get worried about every single game and every single series and if we do that I think it will be a mistake.”