No time for blame game, says India skipper Dhoni

SYDNEY: India must avoid blaming individuals and shoulder the burden of turning their fortunes around collectively after a crushing innings and 68-run defeat by Australia, says captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni.

The tourists were bowled out for 400 on Friday's fourth day of the contest to fall to their second defeat in two weeks and relinquish any hope of recording a first series triumph on Australian soil.

"What we need to do is not just blame one individual. As a team we need to perform," Dhoni told reporters. "It's very important to hunt in packs rather than individuals.

"In patches we have done well. We have got the opposition out. In the last innings we have seen we can score 400-odd runs. We need to get everything together.

"We need to do well as a bowling unit and we need to bat well as a batting unit and come off good fielding performances. We need to get it all together."

There were plenty of candidates for blame after the bowling attack took just one wicket in almost two day's play as Australia's batsmen ran riot at the Sydney Cricket Ground.

India's much-vaunted batting line-up had little to boast about either, failing to register a single century between them in two full innings on a surface where Michael Clarke hammered 329 not out and Ricky Ponting (134) and Mike Hussey (150 not out) also had success.

"It is a bit of a worry but the good thing if see the second innings we saw the batsmen score runs," Dhoni added.

"It was not good enough to defend the test match but what we have seen in the last couple of test matches is everybody has scored at least a 50 which gives us an indication that we need to convert those 50s into big innings and put runs on the board. "We need to keep it really simple and score big hundreds and we need to get wickets."

India could still tie the series with victories in the last two tests in Perth and Adelaide and that remained the team's goal, Dhoni said.

Dhoni, who led India to a 50-over World Cup triumph last year when they were also ranked number one in the world in tests, said India's current difficulties would help him improve.

"You'll lose at times and face difficult times and that's what really improves you as an individual and as a skipper," he said. "If everything comes easy to you then you don't really appreciate the hard work that goes with it."

Copyright Reuters, 2011