Move over long-drawn pathway programmes. Gone are the days when bilateral matches in the lead-up to a World Cup were an event before the big event. In terms of preparation, all that India had in the build-up to their run to the ODI World Cup final was two good weeks in Sri Lanka, where they played at full strength in the Asia Cup, winning the title.
With less than seven months left for the next World Cup (T20), teams will have even fewer bilateral matches to prepare.
India are coming off a cramped T20 series at home against Australia and have two matches in South Africa to be followed by three more against Afghanistan at home. They are currently led by Suryakumar Yadav, one of the five skippers they have tried in the past 14 months. They still don't know, or refuse o announce, who will walk out for the toss in June at the T20 World Cup in the Caribbean and the US.
It hasn't helped that Hardik Pandya, who would call the Indian T20 side his team' last year, is still recovering from an ankle injury. The all-rounder was recently traded back to his original IPL team Mumbai Indians, which is led by Rohit Sharma the other India captaincy contender. MI haven't announced who their captain for the next season will be.
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