The one-day series loss against Pakistan brought an end to a rather disastrous season for India. As the team sits back to take a break till August, it's time to look back at what went wrong after the series win in Pakistan in early 2004.
 

India's 2004-05 season began with the Asia Cup, where they were hot favourites, but came a cropper. Except for a solitary win against Sri Lanka, they had nothing to show for. The next one-day series in Holland was more like a picnic with rain playing spoilsport every time. But India squandered the few opportunities they got. The gurus termed it as 'rustiness'.
 

The ICC Champions Trophy was the perfect setting to end the lean trot. History was on India's side by virtue of their being the joint defending champions along with Sri Lanka. But India came unstuck against Pakistan. This loss, coming as it did in the wake of a 1-2 defeat against England in a one-day series, convinced even the most fanatical Indian supporter that something had gone terribly wrong.
 

The first series win by an Australian team on Indian soil since 1969-70 was conclusive proof of the fact that the Indian team was on a sticky wicket. It was hoped by one and all that the Indians would come back against an opponent they had dominated so often in the recent past, but the much-anticipated bout became a knockout. The Australians outplayed the Indians completely to take the series 2-1. India won the final 'dead' Test on a deteriorating wicket, and might well have won the drawn second Test had rain not washed off the fifth day completely. However, there is no place for ifs and buts in cricket, and the Border-Gavaskar Trophy was no longer with Team India.

The Indians suffered hugely in the series on all fronts. Sourav Ganguly's decision to pull out of the Nagpur Test due to injury after complaining bitterly about the greenish texture of the pitch prompted many to allege that he had backed out. Those were not happy days for Indian cricket and its leader. The likes of Laxman and Dravid struggled throughout the series. Harbhajan could not repeat his 2001 heroics with the ball.

India then beat the visiting South Africans in a two-Test series, but morale evaporated quickly when they flew to Bangladesh. They won both the Test and one-day series over there, but suffered the ignominy of losing a one-day international to Bangladesh for the first time.
 

All this would have been forgiven had India pulled off a win victory against the touring Pakistanis in early 2005. But it was not to be. The arch-rivals squared the Test series and went on to win the one-day series, despite losing the first two games.
 

It was a season wherein practically everything went wrong for India. Every time it looked things couldn't get any worse, a bigger catastrophe followed. There are problems aplenty in Indian cricket at the moment. First and foremost, we have a captain under fire for not performing. The fact that India hasn't been winning consistently isn't helping his cause. Except for Dravid and Sehwag, all the other batsmen are struggling. Irfan Pathan, who is expected to spearhead the Indian bowling for years to come, has already begun to show signs of weariness, just like the other fast bowlers before him. John Wright, who did an outstanding job as coach, has quit.
 

The current Indian team is certainly talented. But then, talent alone cannot guarantee performance. As Sandy Gordon, former sports psychologist of the team, has put it, "The Indians cannot handle pressure."
 

Things are not looking bright at the moment. The best thing the Indians can do is try and forget the horrors of the past, and start the new season with a fresh, vibrant attitude.