Indian middle-order muddle no closer to being resolved despite Asia Cup victory

India managed to win a nail-biting contest against Bangladesh in the Asia Cup 2018 Final yesterday, thanks to comeback man Kedar Jadhav’s resolute knock despite the pain of a hamstring tear and the immense pressure of needing to keep the run chase going against a disciplined bowling effort by Bangladesh.

Jadhav, who was making his comeback to the Indian team after being out for 3 months with a previous hamstring injury sustained during the IPL, managed to hold his nerve and proved to be the difference between the two teams in the end. However, this incredibly tight encounter against a depleted Bangladesh side without their two biggest performers, Tamim Iqbal & Shakib Al Hasan; and Jadhav’s subsequent injury, have brought to the fore one of India’s biggest problems since the phasing out of Suresh Raina & Yuvraj Singh from the ODI Team: the middle-order’s batting woes.

India’s win over Bangladesh yesterday was notable for one very particular stat:

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This is the first time ever since the ICC Cricket World Cup 2015 (over three years ago), that India have managed to chase down a 150+ ODI total without a single fifty from the Top 3.

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This single statistic alone encapsulates how reliant India have been on their top order of Rohit Sharma, Shikhar Dhawan and Virat Kohli to win run-chases. When all three of them fail to get going, as is likely to happen occasionally over the next few months and even at the World Cup, the middle order has been unable to score enough runs at the brisk pace necessary in modern white-ball cricket to chase large totals down comfortably.

This, as many Indian cricket aficionados will recall, was exactly what happened in the ICC Champions Trophy 2017, where India so agonizingly capitulated after seeing the Top 3 get dismissed within the first 10 overs.

Here are some reactions from the Twitter Universe to this now long-standing issue:

Indian middle order without Virat Kohli is a bit of a concern. #INDvBAN #AsiaCup2018 #AsiaCupFinal

— RK (@RK_sports) September 28, 2018

India's middle order is no closer to a solution than it was before the tournament started. Maybe Rayudu at 4 for a while once Kohli returns. But time is running out.

— Harsha Bhogle (@bhogleharsha) September 28, 2018

Rohit led the side really well, was wonderful with his bowling changes. But our middle order issue is getting more worrying. Need to sort this asap #IndvBan

— Mohammad Kaif (@MohammadKaif) September 28, 2018

The concern remains with the middle order. On a day the order fails the middle order makes 222 look like 292. Kartik Dhoni Rayudu all need to contribute more with the bat if India needs to win off days.

— Boria Majumdar (@BoriaMajumdar) September 28, 2018

India’s ODI Team; especially since the early 2000s has always been known to have a strong, match-winning batting lineup that has been the envy of teams around the world. This was evident in the Cricket World Cup 2011; where India’s batting lineup took them all the way to the trophy. The very names in that Starting XI are enough to get a feel for the sheer quality the team possessed:

Sehwag - Tendulkar - Gambhir - Kohli - Yuvraj - Raina - Dhoni - Harbhajan - Zaheer - Munaf - Sreesanth

Compare and contrast that to the ideal Indian Starting XI of the current squad and the drop in quality in the middle-order becomes obvious:

Rohit - Dhawan - Kohli - Rayudu - Karthik - Dhoni - Hardik/Jadeja - Bhuvneshwar - Kuldeep - Chahal - Bumrah

Ambati Rayudu, Dinesh Karthik and MS Dhoni have all merited their place in the ODI Team on the back of excellent individual batting campaigns in IPL 2018. Rayudu (602 runs @ 43.00) was perhaps the batting lynchpin of the CSK lineup, and showed his flexibility by putting in strong performances regularly whether as an opener or as a No.4 batsman.

He was, of course, brilliantly supported by MS Dhoni (455 runs @ 75.83), often coming in at No.5 and finishing the innings with a return to the bludgeoning style of power-hitting he was known for in his early days with Team India. Dinesh Karthik meanwhile (498 runs @ 49.80) was KKR’s middle-order maestro, often rescuing his team from difficult situations and finishing matches with a new-found confidence and adaptability.

All three of them have, however, not been able to show their best form while transitioning to Team India’s ODI side, and this perhaps has to do with the longer format (50 Overs), which requires more application and staying power, the different nature of tracks around the world available in International matches, not all of which are as conducive to batting as pitches in the Indian subcontinent, and maybe even the increased quality of bowling attacks in international cricket as opposed to the IPL, with all due respect.

For all these reasons and more, India find themselves in a fix regarding who to play in positions 4,5 and 6 in the current ODI lineup; and with the World Cup fast approaching next year, there may not even be enough games to trial a new batsman in the middle order and give him the time to succeed and make the position his own in time for the tournament.

With less than 20 ODIs for India to go before the World Cup kicks off; the rest of India’s batsmen outside of the top order need to find form and find it fast if they are to stand a serious chance of lifting the most coveted trophy in cricket in the UK next summer.