Having clinched the Test series 2-0, one would expect the Indians to experiment going into the dead rubber in Mumbai. But skipper Mahendra singh dhoni begs to differ. With a tough series in Australia coming up, Dhoni made it clear that playing the best possible XI was the priority and not experimenting.
"We might rest a player here or there just to ensure that the players are fresh, but too much experimentation is not on our minds. Playing the best possible XI is our main aim, and for the record I will be playing the third Test," he said.
"The West Indies are a good side as they showed in the second innings here and we don't want to be complacent. It will be a tough test for us and we will try and not predict the outcome before the match ends."
Commenting on his own knock, Dhoni said: "Rahul (Dravid) and Laxman (VVS) had put us in a strong position and when I came in after Rahul's dismissal, I wanted to go after the bowling. But the ploy, obviously, wasn't working and that is when I decided that I should graft a little before going for my shots.
"After a while, Devendra Bishoo started bowling a negative line and Marlon Samuels was brought into the attack and then I decided that it was time to bring out the shots and capitalise. capitalise. Laxman's presence definitely helped."
Having kept wickets for close to six years, Dhoni feels the present lot of bowlers might be young, but they definitely look fresher than the previous lot. "I think this lot has a lot of fresh energy and look well balanced. While Umesh is keen to run in hard every single time, even Pragyan Ojha, who has been in and out of the playing XI, looks fresh - as does newcomer R Ashwin," he said.
Darren Bravo said that the team was really disappointed that they couldn't save the follow- on after putting up a much better effort in their second essay. "The batsmen settled down and then threw their wickets away. The wicket hadn't changed much since the first innings. Just that we applied ourselves better in the second innings and showed that we can stick it out," he said.
Speaking on his own batting, Bravo said: "It was helpful that I initially had Shivnaraine Chaderpaul for company. He has played here before and knows how to stick it out. I learned a lot from seeing him graft. But I didn't curb my natural instinct to go after loose deliveries.
© Yahoo cricket
