5 strategic problems that the Indian T20I team needs to solve now

#5 No out-of-the-box thinking

India needs to play more fearless cricket

In a way, the Indian team surprised the world in 2007 when they lifted the maiden ICC World T20 trophy. No one had expected them to win as they had left all their big guns. But that is the thing they did differently.

While all the teams with their big stars were playing percentage cricket, India's young brand of unknown faces were playing fearlessly. By innovating, and playing selfless, eye-dazzling cricket, it was India in a way that showed the world how to play the shortest format of the game.

India in a short while became the biggest promoter of this format when they started the IPL. No wonder, India became synonymous with T20 cricket. But ironically, all teams have now taken a leaf out of our book to perfect the art while India have fallen behind.

The reason is simple: most teams do not have such a rigid, complicated approach to playing T20 cricket. They pack their teams with T20 specialists who are young big-hitting all-rounders.

India seem to have fallen behind in this regard as even after years of the IPL, we have struggled to produce proper T20 specialists or big-hitting all-rounders. The core of the Indian team that plays Tests, ODIs and T20s is the same.

Unlike India, not many teams still have players from the last decade who are still their most reliable all-rounders and power-hitters. The lack of new, emerging all-rounders has been a big problem.

It is sad to see that Rishabh Pant who has been in great form in domestic cricket has failed to get a game so far. Nor is there much flexibility to India's thinking like have floaters in an unpredictable batting order.

In fact, a sense of predictability has crept into the extent that the opposition knows who would come in to bat next or the fact that the next batsman would inevitably play himself in and never go for a reverse sweep.

India lifted the World T20 when they dared to think out of the box, a practice which is out of fashion now in a team that plays predictable and old-fashioned cricket in T20Is.

It is important to remember here that India were almost knocked out ignominiously in the early stages of the World T20 2016. It was only luck and the sheer brilliance of Virat Kohli that carried them through.

Kohli's superhuman form had helped gloss over the problems in India's T20I team. It's only when he fails that the problems become all too visible.