09 March,2010 08:19 AM IST | | Ashwin Ferro
The Indian forwardline was guilty once again of spilling chances galore as they were held to an embarrassing 3-3 draw by South Africa in their last league encounter of the Hero Honda World Cup.
The guilty men upfront being the very same players who have been found wanting throughout this tournament.
The woefully out of form, Deepak Thakur hurt himself during training and so didn't feature in this fixture too.
However, two of his colleagues, Prabhjot Singh and Gurvinder Chandi, ensured the Indian team did not feel his absence. If Thakur had been missing sitters till now, yesterday it was Prabhjot's turn who made no mistake in making more mistakes. Firstly, the ball hardly reached Prabhjot given his preposterous positioning behind the South African goalkeeper. And whenever the ball did manage to somehow make its way to him, he made a hash of the opportunity.
As though Prabhjot's problems were not enough for Team India, Chandi made matters worse with his pathetic trapping and over-enthusiastic run-ins that had him gifting away possession to the opponents quite often.
Thankfully, the entire forwardline was not poor. Shivendra Singh proved once again how costly his two-match absence from India's World Cup campaign may have been. He was banned from the games against Australia and Spain for lifting his stick dangerously in the opener against Pakistan. Shivendra's return saw India give the English a run for their money during the 2-3 loss. Yesterday too whenever he came on the field he made things happen.
Sadly, in a team game, one man cannot make the difference, and especially not when his teammates are not up to the mark.
India drag-flicker Sandeep Singh admitted to MiD DAY that the forwardline needed some tweaking.
"The midfield and defence has been OK, but our finishing has been a problem. We cannot afford to miss so many chances. Of course, our opponents have to be given credit for defending well too," said Sandeep.
Shivendra on his part could only express helplessness at the situation. "Some of the forwards tend to be in a hurry when they receive the ball and this haste often ends up inu00a0 wasting the entire move. I think we need to plan our attacks better," said Shivendra.
