Jadeja plays down role in team’s transformation

“I don’t think the transformation in the team’s attitude is entirely due to me. When we win matches, everything goes right. It is the result which ultimately counts. What matters is how you play. I just do what I feel is right at that particular moment. It might have clicked, like the time I bowled that 47th over against England and claimed three wickets. Otherwise, I would have been accused of throwing away a match,” he said after the winover Pakistan yesterday.

Team coach Anshuman Gaekwad admitted that Jadeja “has been doing a great job” as a skipper. “He had been able to win even low-scoring matches.”Jadeja said: “Every member of the team has contributed to the victories.” He was particularly happy the way wicketkeeper Nayan Mongia performed despite running fever in the first game and having suffered injury on his mouth in a later game.

Gaekwad said talking to players about their commitment to the game has helped. “Ours is a good team. They have been making efforts in the past also. What is important is winning. Even with all their efforts if we don’t win, it has no value,” he said.

Both Jadeja and Gaekwad lauded the efforts of Sadogopan Ramesh who “has adjusted himself well from Test cricket to One-day games.” Gaekwad had a long chat with Ramesh before the start of the game against Pakistan on Tuesday. “I told him to play his own game and not to put pressure on himself. Improvisation will come automatically,” Gaekwadsaid.

Jadeja has come out triumphs as a leader even in pressure games against England and Pakistan. “I made a blunder today (Tuesday), getting out when we were a few runs away from the target. I should have stayed on till the end. But these small things are forgotten now because we have won.”

“The Pakistanis have been tasting victory for a long time. Today they dropped a couple of catches. Not that it would have made any difference to the final result. But what I want to emphasise is that such things do happen. You cannot expect to win always. What matters is how you play,” he said.

Gaekwad hit the nail on the head, saying: “There were complaints that the team’s approach in earlier games was lazy and not aggressive enough. I was confident the team can deliver the goods. I told the boys that we can come back even after losing to Pakistan in the first game. It was just a matter of getting our act together.”

The last time India beat Pakistan here was in 1997 and Tuesday’s win was only the fifth in21 matches that India had tasted victory over their traditional rivals in this desert venue.

Skipper Mohammed Azharuddin, meanwhile, is facing one of the most embarrassing situations in his long career. What he failed to achieve and get out of the team members, Jadeja has been able to do in the last three games. Expectations from him (Azhar) in the final on Friday against Pakistan will thus be far greater than during the beginning of this tournament.