South Africa Ahead

Win against West Indies on 27th november ends the home season for India. India's home season was quite exciting where they defended their no. 1 spot in ODIs against Australia. Then it was more of a Sachin Tendulkar's Farewell series than India vs West Indies test series & that man deserved so. Ofcourse India white washed windies in that series. ODI series after tests didn't match the standards which were set during India - Australia series but win is a win & victory is always sweet.

As team India has reached South Africa,  it is a big challenge waiting for them ahead as no one has forgotten those white washes in England and Australia in test matches as here conditions will be similar to Australia and England but there'll be only two matches. Actually This tour was scheduled much bigger consisting of more matches but Haroon Logart tried to be oversmart. I think he forgot that BCCI has more than 70% stake in ICC. Anyways India will be facing challenges in both the formats there. Let me put some light on those challenges.

One Day Internationals

In ODIs India has created wonders in recent times as India has won 5 consecutive ODI tournaments this year from Champions league to bilateral series with West Indies last month. India's top order has been a phenomena as Dhawan, Sharma & Kohli are playing their best cricket at the moment. India's fielding has also been good. India's concern in limited overs is their middle order and bowling in slog overs. Yuvraj and Raina are searching for their form & bowlers are giving too many runs in the slog overs.

'Silent ho jaa warna main violent ho jaunga' - Yuvraj Singh said to his critics with a half century in the last match against West Indies & hopefully Raina will also be among the runs soon. So batting will not cause much of a problem to India but bowling is going to. I think India is going to miss Zaheer Khan in their bowling department as all other bowlers inexperienced ones. Ishant Sharma has been lucky to be included in the squad but this is Sandip Patil's selection panel boss you have to accept the unexpected.

Test Matches

In test matches India is very tough to beat at home but as they move out of sub-continent things change drastically or it almost become the opposite, at least its last two outings suggest so. In this outing things are going to be even more difficult as the likes of Dravid, Tendulkar, Laxman, Sehwag and Gambhir are not in the squad. So this team India doesn't have that experience but it has the same potential.

Again Dhawan, Pujara, Kohli & Rohit Sharma are in best of their forms & ofcourse Dhoni down the order is a big threat to every bowler in the world. Here inclusion of Zaheer Khan is a big boost in the bowling department. Zaheer Khan has dismissed Graeme Smith 12 times so far & I am sure that Zaheer is going to increase that number. I think here India is going to miss Gambhir & I don't know why he is being ignored as his batting average is more than 90 in this ranji season. I am not going to repeat that Sandip Patil statement again it is going to be like that only.

Overall an exciting tour awaits ahead which is going to start from the Pink Day. Both the teams are competitive and strong none of them can be written off. I have my favourite players in both the teams but ultimately I want India to outperform South Africa in both the formats of the game. So let's see how it goes,  may the best team India win.