India’s fielding standard has fallen, admits coach R Sridhar

India’s performance has been overall good since their premature exit from the ICC World Cup 2019 as they have not lost a single series in this time. But the Men in Blue’s fielding has not been particularly good in the ongoing tour of New Zealand though their fielding coach R Sridhar on Friday refused to blame the tight international schedules as the reason for that.

Recently, a number of Indian cricketers have been hit by injuries and even captain Virat Kohli has raised concerns over the fact. On the eve of the second ODI that India have to win to keep the three-game series alive, Sridhar said India’s fielding has been average at best over the last four months.

India allowed the Black Caps to overhaul their big total of 347 for 4 with four wickets and 11 balls to spare in the first ODI in Hamilton on Wednesday. The Indian bowling and fielding looked listless after their magnificent 5-0 win in the T20I series preceding that.

“…the West Indies series at home was somewhere we really dropped. We were average, to say the least. But definitely, we have not lived to the standards as we did in the World Cup or even in the build-up to the World Cup in the last couple years,” Sridhar said.

‘Team management monitors players’ workloads’: R Sridhar

The fielding coach added that they acted on the slide in the fielding standard through a grading system privy to the support staff members. He said the team management keeps a close watch on the players’ workload and practice schedules.

“We keep reminding the players about attention to basic detail…In a T20 game, each fielder has to be his own captain. He need not wait for the captain to move him or the bowler to move him in a certain direction or to a certain position.

We try and tell them to think ahead of the game, you as a fielder captain yourself, see which way the breeze is, which way the batsman’s tendencies to hit are, what’s the bowler’s plan and position accordingly. So, we empower the fielders so that they can become their own captain and they can take decisions on their own because the captain has got too much on his plate at certain times. That’s what we speak about,” the 49-year-old added.

Sridhar said the players have to adjust to the fact that the current schedule is tight and play around it. He said the Indian cricketers hardly had a session during the entire T20 schedule and not much they could do in terms of putting technical work on the ground.

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