espnstar.com’s Rajarshi Gupta spoke to former Indian spinner Maninder Singh after India’s ousting from the Champions Trophy.

Singh was a furious man on Wednesday night and he lashed out at the Indian skipper, who he thought was trying too many things too fast.

“He (Dhoni) is not keeping things simple and sweet, like he did sometime back. When the team was winning, everyone thought Dhoni was a shrewd thinker of the game and I think he went too far with all those accolades.”

 India lost their first match of the ICC Champions Trophy against Pakistan and had to win against Australia but as fate would have it, the rain gods decided to play spoilsport.

Once the match against the world champions was washed out, India had to rely on Pakistan beating Australia besides thrashing the West Indies by a whooping margin in the second match at Johannesburg.

Singh felt India lack bench strength and the reserves were exposed in the absence of Virender Sehwag, Yuvraj Singh and Zaheer Khan.

“There is so much talk of the bench strength. Where is the bench strength? We don’t have enough quality players in the team,” the former left-arm spinner quipped.

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However, Singh, now one of the top cricket analysts in the country said the elimination should be a ‘wake-up’ call for the Indians.

“We were on a winning spree a few months back but we did not realise that our bowling and fielding kept getting weaker.

We talked of being the number one team in the world despite a weak bowling attack.”

Singh preserved his wrath for the youngsters in the team, who he thought cannot be relied upon. Their mentality, he said, was poor and the attitude lacked sting.

“We cannot rely on the likes of Virat Kohli and Suresh Raina. They looked satisfied with what they did and that is unpardonable. Their conscience has to wake up.”

Singh opined that Rahul Dravid’s return to the ODI squad showed that the youngsters lacked mettle and ability to excel at the international level.

Was that a slight on the younger members in the team? “Well, I don’t think that makes a difference to them. You have a coach, a great support staff, Paddy Upton and yet the performance has been appalling,” Singh fumed.

Questions will be asked. After all India, have been smashed out of contention of the second successive ICC event within a span of four months.

For a team, trying to establish itself as the best in the world, things need to take a better turn.

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