Azarudin wants to end Experiment, blames Batsmen for Team India fail

Bangalore, Dec 5 (UNI) Seeking an introspection on the poor performance of Indian batsmen in South Africa in ODI series where the team received a 0-4 whitewash, former Captain Mohammed Azaruddin today wanted the team management to end experimentation.

Talking to newsmen after launching a new NEO Sports channel here, he said "it is batting failure which led to complete whitewash at the hands of South Africa. Bowlers have done their duty but if there is no socre on the board how can you expect a positive result".

He said that openers should be on the crease atleat facing 15 overs and scoring.

Replying to a question, he said the Coach need not be blamed for failure of the team since his duty ends when the team entered the field. ''In the field it is players who have to perform and it is the responsibility of the Captain to encourage the players in the field'' he added.

Azaruddin said that the time has come for the players to sit and workout strategy to bounce back and perform well in the test series.

"The players need a lot of direction. I think players need to sit and study the reasons for the failure. South African bowlers really bowled well but we have to blame our batsman who allowed oppoents to bowl well" he added.

Replying to a question, he said that "may be too much cricket might have also added to the debacle. There should be gap for players to study their performance'' he said adding ''Players need rest, may be new players may be tested'' To another question about inclusion of former Team India skipper Sourav Ganguly into the team, Azaruddin said that " I dont know how far his inclusion would help the team".

Former Sri Lankan Cricket legend Arvind D Silva, who was also present said that "for a success of a team, a combination of everything is needed besdies a performing coach. Captain should take lead in building confidence among the players".

Referring to debacle of Team India in the recent past, D'Silva said that "India needs to get batting line up built and players need to be filled with confidence".

Neo Sports Chief Executive Officer Shashi Kalathil said that the channel would start functioning with the series beginning against visiting West Indies in January 2007.

He said that the new channel would also cover domestic cricket tournaments also including Ranji and Challenger series. "Some of the initiatives inc lnclude providing international quality coverage of domestic cricket, multi lingual feeds for international and domestic matches, new technologies and methods of analysis, sports entertainment concepts around cricket, differentiated produce offerings for DTH, cable, internet to name a few with more announcements in this area to follow".

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