First of all, congratulations to the West Indies team. Full credit to their batsmen for chasing down a big total against India despite losing two early wickets and keeping their cool in the end to make it to the World T20 final. Sadly for India, it wasn’t to be.

Our batting department did very well; a total of 192 in a World T20 semi-final is always a challenging score, irrespective of the wicket. There were some good contributions at the top of the order from Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma and Ajinkya Rahane.

We bowled well in the first six overs and got Chris Gayle and Marlon Samuels early with the new ball but unfortunately there was heavy dew in the second innings and that allowed Lendl Simmons, Johnson Charles and Andre Russell to bat with freedom.

What made a big difference was those two no-balls bowled by Ravi Ashwin and Hardik Pandya. They gave two lives to Simmons, who ended up scoring 82 from 51 balls. He should have been out first on 18 and then 50 and when you give chances to a good player like Simmons, it becomes almost impossible to win a T20 game.

If India had taken those two wickets in time, the situation could have been different and MS Dhoni could have gone according to his tried-and-tested plan. Ashwin would have bowled his four overs in the middle and Ashish Nehra then could have bowled at the death.

But as we saw, Ashwin went for 20 runs in two overs and then didn’t get a chance, Nehra was bowled out earlier than expected and the last over was bowled by Kohli.

One can say that Dhoni’s captaincy was not quite up to the mark as it generally is. It won’t be unfair to say that we lost the toss and basically lost the game. Everybody knew that dew will be a factor and once India were asked to bowl second, it became clear Dhoni wouldn’t be able to execute his plans properly. However, this is international cricket and you have cope with the conditions and make the necessary adjustments, which India didn’t.

You can’t control dew, but what you can do is control the no-balls. If the bowlers had not overstepped, maybe we would have won the match.

Looking at individual efforts, we finally got a good start at the top of the order. Both Rohit and Rahane made 40 or more. But Rahane’s knock of 40 came from 35 balls. If he had batted more aggressively and made 50 or 55 from 35 balls, India would have had a bigger total to defend. But it was Rahane’s first game and the openers were also under pressure to give a good start, so it was a decent job.

Dhoni did not get a lot of deliveries to bat while the other power hitter – Suresh Raina – didn’t bat at all. So that meant it was all down to Virat and he came up with the goods once again.

It is disheartening for me that India lost despite such a marvellous innings from him. Among the bowlers, no doubt Nehra did very well. But Jasprit Bumrah, despite getting Gayle out early, went for more than 10 runs an over. Pandya also gave away 10 runs an over while the spinners were no different, with Ravindra Jadeja taken for 12 an over. And that’s why I have always maintained that we need a specialist fifth bowler, be it Harbhajan Singh or even Mohammad Shami.

But in their absence, the bowling department lacked that extra bit of experience. We didn’t quite click as a unit in this World T20. We did win matches but that was because of a couple of good individual performances, like Virat’s knock against Australia. That collective effort was somehow missing.

If you have to win the World T20, you have to play as a unit throughout. I feel it was a fair result for India in the end. While the team didn’t perform as expected, I think it is in good shape. We won the Asia Cup, won in Australia, reached the semifinals of the World T20, so overall it was a decent few months for the boys.

No doubt we need to make improvements but this current bunch is very talented and can take the team forward.

And lastly, Dhoni. I feel the media should simply leave him alone. If you keep asking him the same questions about his captaincy, future and retirement, he is bound to get upset at some point. He is a human being after all.

If Dhoni has to face the tough questions, let them be about the reasons for defeat or match strategy but not about his retirement or future. That’s a decision either Dhoni or the Indian selectors need to take. It would be better if the public and media don’t make decisions about Dhoni’s career.