The India stand-in captain during the painful 3-0 ODI series whitewash in South Africa believes the time is ripe for India to “transform” their white-ball game. The team faced successive losses in Paarl and Cape Town to concede the series to what still happens to be an inexperienced and in-transition South African side.
The bitter four-run loss in the final one-dayer in Cape Town on January 23 was India’s eighth defeat in their previous nine ODIs played outside Asia from the start of 2020. Since the 2019 World Cup, India’s bowling average (43.52) and economy rate (6.19) have been the worst across the globe.
This, at a time where their batting has also not been at its best, has been an obvious reason for the downward spiral the team’s ODI game has been on.
Aware of the declining results in ODIs – a format India have notably played irregularly, with longish breaks since the last World Cup – Rahul said there are “massive learnings” to be taken for everyone involved, stressing that the time for transition and transformation is right here.
“There were massive learnings. We are at a stage right now where we have World Cups as the focus. We are working towards certain things. We are working towards getting better as a team and learning,”
“I feel like we’ve played some really good cricket over the last four or five years, but it is also time for a little bit of… for us to get better and transform our white-ball cricket. And that’s been the chat. I don’t use that an excuse for not winning, but we are a work in progress as a team,”
Rahul said on India Today.
The tour of South Africa was also difficult on a personal front for Rahul, whose captaincy credentials were questioned widely by the fans and experts. India lost the second Test in Johannesburg when he led the team in the absence of Virat Kohli before going through a whitewash in ODIs with Rohit Sharma missing.
Some even went to the extent of suggesting Rahul’s quiet, reserved nature is his biggest issue, mistaking it for a sense of timidness in his approach. A section of fans believed Rahul lacked the aggression and the intent that Kohli displayed when he was at the helm.
But it is important to cut Rahul some slack, for the tour of South Africa was the first time he was captaining the team in a List A game and also only the second occasion he was leading a side in a first-class game. Rahul’s captaincy experience is mainly limited to T20 cricket, in which he led Punjab Kings for two successive IPL seasons.
“For me it was my first time as leading. It was great, actually – there is so much you learn from losses and losses make you so much stronger than starting off with victories,”
he said, finding similarities with his journey as a Test player.
“My career has always been that way: I have always got things slowly. I have always had to start with a punch or a hit. It happened with me with my Test career,” added the 29-year-old, who revived his Test career with performances in England and South Africa.
Rahul, who has been appointed captaincy of Lucknow Super Giants for IPL 2022, will have the chance to groom into a better skipper at the international arena with Rohit set to return via the West Indies limited-overs series and likely to be appointed the new full-time Test captain.
