India can defend Twenty20 title: Dhoni

[minisoji]

MUMBAI: Despite players’ fatigue factor looming large skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni was optimistic about India retaining the World Twenty20 title in England.



“We have a balanced side. We bat right down to 8 or 9. This is not to say we lack in bowling. We have a strong bowling attack too,” he said before departing with teammates for London by an afternoon flight here on Friday.

“We have some outstanding talents in our team and we need to focus on playing to our potential without worrying about the result. We have to give 100 percent and hopefully we can defend the title,” he said about the team’s prospects in the tournament starting June 5.

Though fears have been expressed in some quarters including by team coach Gary Kirsten that his players may be jaded after playing non-stop since the beginning of the tour to New Zealand, Dhoni brushed them aside by saying every Indian player would now be used to this.

“We are all used to it by now. I came into international cricket in 2004 and have slowly got used to it.

The weather in India is such that we can play cricket almost right through the year at various parts of the country.

It’s not a concern,” said Dhoni.

Dhoni said he was pleased that he had plenty of options with regard to non-regular bowlers especially in the spin department and that all his players have the experience of handling pressure by playing in the IPL.

“We have plenty of options with our part-time bowlers especially spinners.

We have Rohit Sharma and Yuvraj Singh, who have taken hat-tricks in the IPL in South Africa. We also have Suresh Raina. Yusuf Pathan is there too,” he said.

“International cricket is about handling pressure situations well and the team that handles pressure better would do well. We have someone like Ravindra Jadeja with limited international experience but with high talent.

He has played against some top fast bowlers and spinners in the IPL and has learned to handle pressure,” said Dhoni.

The India skipper was not too concerned about the team’s opening combinations due to the indifferent form of opening batsmen Virender Sehwag and Gautam Gambhir and bowlers Ishant Sharma and Zaheer Khan.

“I am not at all worried. Both the opening batsmen are talented. As regards opening bowling combination we have not yet decided who will do it. You have seen spinners too opening the bowling in the IPL. Teams have to take gamble,” said Dhoni.

He said the team members would have to make best use of the days they have at their disposal after reaching England prior to India’s opening match.

“It’s good we have warm-up games against tough sides like New Zealand and Pakistan. We also have practice sessions and need to make use of these,” said Dhoni.

Indian squad: Mahendra Singh Dhoni (captain), Virender Sehwag, Gautam Gambhir, Suresh Raina, Yuvraj Singh, Rohit Sharma, Yusuf Pathan, Irfan Pathan, Ravindra Jadeja, Harbhajan Singh, Praveen Kumar, Zaheer Khan, Rudra Pratap Singh, Pragyan Ojha and Ishant Sharma