India will have to quickly come up with a new Twenty20 game plan, particularly against the rising ball, to stay in the top bracket of the game's shortest format, Lalchand Rajput, who coached the 2007 cup-winning side, has warned. Rajput said the biggest difference between then and now is that other teams had caught up with India over the last two years, largely due to the experience their players have gained in the two IPL seasons since then.
Rajput described India's knockout from the ICC World Twenty20 on Sunday as "frightening" and said the two straight defeats against West Indies and England in the Super Eights stage had "hurt a lot" personally. He also said that talk of a rift between Dhoni and an injured Virender Sehwag appeared to have affected the players and added that Sehwag's loss impacted the team's performance.
"Most of the teams have worked out what they need to do against India," Rajput told. "Just look at how West Indies and England worked on their bouncers against India. They did that very well because they knew that some of our players were not comfortable against the bouncing ball. They used that weapon very well, which is difficult to do in this format. So we should give credit to England and West Indies. Most of the foreign players in World Twenty20 have also played two seasons of IPL. So all the other teams have got a hang of Twenty20, and there's better planning in place this time on what should be done and what should not be. India will have to be watchful now and come up with something different."