"Eye-opener for us" - Rahul Dravid reacts to visitors' 3-0 whitewash in India vs South Africa ODIs

Indian men's head coach Rahul Dravid has called his side's white-wash against South Africa a "good eye-opener". He attributed the 3-0 humbling to a lack of exposure to ODIs, the absence of some crucial players and basic mistakes in the middle-overs, while also promising improvement before the 2023 World Cup.

The visitors were outplayed in the first two ODIs, losing the games by 31 runs and seven wickets respectively. The final match, played in Cape Town on Sunday, went down to the wire but KL Rahul and Co. once again fell short by four runs.

Speaking at the post-series press conference, Dravid said:

"This One-Day series has certainly been a good eye-opener for us. We have not played a lot of One-Day cricket. Obviously, it's my first stint with the One-Day side but even the team hasn't played a lot of One-Day cricket since the last World Cup. I think the last they played was against England in March of last year."

He added:

"And luckily, I think, we've got a fair bit of time before the World Cup next year. And you know, it's going to be a lot of cricket from now on till then in the white-ball formats. I think it's going to be a good opportunity for us to really reflect and learn and look to keep improving and getting better. And yeah, we'll get better, we'll improve, there's no doubt about that."

In fact, although it was a second-string team, India's last ODI series came against Sri Lanka in July 2021 under Dravid, who had acted as head coach in an interim capacity. The Proteas haven't had much ODI preparation of late either. They last played in the format in July 2021 too - against Ireland in a 3-match away rubber.

Further in the presser, Dravid suggested that the non-availability of Ravindra Jadeja and Hardik Pandya (both unfit at the time of selection) hurt the balance of the side. He also admitted that they would have won a couple of games had the batters shown more responsible shot-selection and composure. He said:

"We could certainly do better with the batting in the middle-overs. Certainly. We understand the template. You know, a large part of your template is also dependent on the balance of your squad... If you are being honest, some of the guys that have helped us out here and given us those all-round options at 6, 7 and 8 are not here, are not available for selection. So probably when they come back, they'll give us a little more depth which allows us to play in a certain slightly different style."

Dravid added:

"But having said that, even South Africa who batted first on two occasions scored only 290 as well ... If I think about the 30th over in those two games, we should have chased it down but we didn't because we played some poor shots and we didn't play smart cricket at critical situations."

India's batting issues can be gaged by the fact that after Shikhar Dhawan, Virat Kohli, and Rishabh Pant, Shardul Thakur was the top scorer in the series and he only featured in the first two games.

"We need to improve our wicket-taking options" - Rahul Dravid

India clearly lacked behind South Africa in terms of wickets in the middle-overs. Dravid acknowledged it was an issue with not just the spinners but the entire attack.

He said:

"Without singling out just the spinners, I think through the middle-overs we need to improve our wicket-taking options. Spinners do play a big role in that but the quicks coming back, the kind of balls we bowl also - we have discussed that, spoken about that, we understand that that's an area of the game where we've been behind a little bit, just that ability to take wickets through the middle and what we need to do about that."

Dravid and Co. will get a chance to show improvement in two weeks when the West Indies tour India for a couple of white-ball series, starting on February 6.