The clear pre-tournament favourites for many was the most disappointing team in the tournament. A batting line-up filled with explosive stars like Gilchrist, Gibbs, Symonds and Afridi was supposedly the sure-fire hit for twenty-20 cricket, yet they failed miserably. To be fair, on another year, the same people like Afridi and Gibbs could well have taken apart every opposition to boring sports psychologists. But then, the catch with these guys has been the big tag called ‘inconsistency’.

Gibbs is not part of the South African team. Why? Dropped due to his recent lack of consistency and form.

Afridi… can you associate this guy on dependability and consistency? With his bowling yes but certainly not by his batting.

Gilchrist… though he has been their best player with many good knocks, there has also been his fair share of out and out failures. A look at his recent form while he was playing for Australia also shows signs of dwindling consistency. After all, didn’t he not go for an entire world cup with ordinary performances and then magically fired in the final with a great knock.

So their coaches/management should have considered the risks behind fielding their players, should have thought well in building a right base of local talent, which they have out and out ignored. Is there anyone from the local lads who had a decent run? Without a shadow of doubt they were the worst of the local talent compared to the other teams. The management simply did not invest enough on hunting the right people.

After all the teams who are there in the semi-finals are the ones who have paid attention to their local talent base and quite clearly these so called lesser knows were the toast to their success. Teams like the Kolkatta Knight riders who had a good local talent base but choose to ignore them took a very deserving stick.

But the biggest and the most disappointing aspect of the Deccan Chargers was their bowling. To be honest, it has been the single most valid reason for their failure not their batting. One look at the stats and you can see that their win ratio largely depended on their strike bowler’s performances. The likes of R.P. Singh and Vaas looks washed out and flat and on a serious note on Vaas, he ought to hang his boots and give the lamp over to Maharoof. RP may have once been among the contenders of the purple cap but quite honestly with the exception of maybe 2 matches, none of it was flattering for someone with a good international experience.

It was nice to see Gilchrist keeping his faith in Vijaykumar and Ojha who both seem to have some ability. And the biggest mystery would be the faith in Sanjay Bangar for such an extended time, where each match was a disaster. I did not find Laxman’s captaincy inspiring and he often looked totally clueless. Rohit Sharma was the next best player after Gilchrist, whose slump towards the end took out the only working teeth in their batting attack.

Seriously thinking, this batting line-up could have taken the rest apart, maybe next year but the management has to have a very serious look at revamping and strengthening their bowling attack and spend significantly time and faith into understanding the abilities of their local talent and pick out the better ones.