Rahul Dravid, rightly called the wall of Indian batting, bid adieu to ODI with a swift 83rd half-century. Dravid has been one of the finest Indian cricketers of all times. The statistics speak for themselves. Only five batsmen have scored more than 80 half-centuries in one-day international cricket. He is among the eight cricketers to score over 10,000 runs in ODIs. He is technically sound, has fine catching hands and is a remarkable team player. He played a key role in rebuilding Team Indian along with Saurav Ganguly and MS Dhoni over the last decade and has been a great ambassador of the sport. He showed remarkable character by handling the twin responsibilities of batting and wicket-keeping during the early years of the last decade, when India was struggling to find a wicket-keeper and getting the team combination right, before the arrival of Parthiv Patel and MS Dhoni on the scene. It’s now time for the likes of Virat Kohli and Suresh Raina to fill the gap and take Indian cricket forward.
The English played better all-round cricket and deserved to win the Test and Natwest ODI series against India. The English team was consistent in their performance and outsmarted Indians in all versions of the game. All is not lost, though, for India as they found Parthiv Patel back in action, a rising star in Rahane, and a budding all-rounder in Ravindra Jadeja. Hope they get more opportunities to play in the near future.