Bengaluru, March 6: India’s problem is a good problem to have. It’s just that depending on a situation you have to be flexible and play horses for courses. Like for example, today [in the match against Ireland] M S Dhoni realized this is a drier pitch, that the ball will turn, so he decided to field first and play two spinners and stick with Piyush Chawla and the ball has turned. Zaheer Khan has bowled well. Yet on another occasion it could be a flat pitch where you might want to play three fast bowlers or if it’s a pitch like we saw today at Chennai, England versus South Africa, where the ball is turning then who knows R Ashwin might also play. It all depends on what kind of pitch you get on a given day and you have to be prepared to be flexible but the core seven will stay the same.

If Suresh Raina has to play he has to replace one of the batsmen and if you are playing two spinners Piyush and Ashwin and three fast bowlers then you have to drop one batsman.

The fielding has to improve. I think they will. The Indians are slow starters but they would have seen the way they performed in the first two games and if they perform at that level of fielding you can’t win the World Cup. You need an improvement.

The fact that they have Dhoni as a captain is huge plus because he is cool. He doesn’t allow pressure to get to him and his body language rubs off on the others.

In a long tournament, there are bound to be niggles so you have to be careful that your bowlers, someone like Zaheer [Khan], the spearhead of the pace attack, he bowled beautifully today, is in the best of conditions and you got to make sure of that. But the good thing is there are a few days of rest in between matches. It’s only now that India play three matches quickly but then again there is a break of eight/ nine days . Then there is the quarter-final, where there would be four days of break and then it goes on from there.

Zaheer Khan as the bowling captain is very good, experienced and like you saw today he bowled beautifully, he was right on the money and the fact that he stands at mid-on, mid-off, helping the other bowlers is very good.

He might get the white ball to reverse swing here because, here, this pitch seems to be a little rougher so it means the ball will also get scuffed-up. I won’t be surprised if he gets reverse swing here.

Munaf Patel is another bowler who can get the ball to reverse swing. If Zaheer gets it here, Munaf will also get some reverse swing here. It all depends on the conditions and you will get the reverse swing as the tournament progresses because its going to get hotter and hotter in the month of March. We are only on the sixth of March, come the 20th its going to be hot all around the country and by the time you get to the final it will be sweltering heat in Mumbai. The pitches will get slower, pitches will get rougher, outfield might get a little rougher, you know there are your chances.

On the matter of the UDRS system, it will be a case where it will take time. It will have to satisfy everybody it will have to convince everybody it is 95% - 98% or even 98% full-proof. As it is now they have changed the rule today. Now there is none of that 2.5 meters, you can refer it to the umpire, all you got to tell him this is the ball is going to hit the stumps so which means Ian Bell would have been out that day.

In the case of Hotspot, it is something that has to come. It is expensive, there are only three or four around. The day that comes to every cricket match then I am sure the teams will be more inclined to the review system.

Coming to what this World Cup means to Sachin Tendulkar. Big! He’s never won a World Cup. He’s got probably every record in the book that exists. Winning the World Cup will be for him one of his greatest achievements. You know he has achieved so many great things in his career but this will be the icing on the cake.

He will want that. He is a proud cricketer, still as passionate about the game. Still as hungry , still works as hard as he did and still many times, like a baby, you know, he just wants to go out there [and] enjoy himself and he plays to win and nothing will be bigger than the World Cup.

(As told to Prajakta Pawar)