No rift in Indian team (From Asian Image)

No rift in Indian team

9:40am Wednesday 11th January 2012 in Sport

India batsman Rahul Dravid has dismissed reports skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni has fallen out with vice-captain Virender Sehwag.

The 39-year-old claimed suggestions of a rift in the camp were simply the result of losing the opening two Tests against Australia.

"When you lose 2-0, that's part and parcel of what happens, suddenly everything is wrong," Dravid said.

"So there's absolutely no truth to those matters."

The veteran insisted team morale was good, saying external distractions like Sunil Gavaskar's recent criticism of a go-karting trip to Perth and Australia wicketkeeper Brad Haddin branding them "mentally fragile" would not distract them.

"One of the good things about touring abroad is you're in a bit of a cocoon," said Dravid when asked about the response in India to the team going go-karting.

"You don't tend to know what's happening back home, you can never really gauge the feelings of what's happening back home.

"You're a bit away from all of it, so in a way it's good.

"I think the spirit in the team has been good. The enthusiasm to practise, and the overall energy around the squad, has been good.

"There is a sense of disappointment in the results we've had so far, and we'd like to do better.

"(There are also) a lot of conversations that happen in the course of dressing rooms, in the course of dinners, in the course of when we go go-karting.

"So lots of conversations can happen in times like that, that are very useful. You don't learn through sitting in meetings and having power-point presentations, that's not how teams work."

Dravid insisted Haddin's comments would not be used as extra motivation heading into the third Test.

"I don't think we need anyone's comments to motivate ourselves," Dravid said.

"If you're playing for India you don't need anybody's comments to motivate you. I don't think we're that bothered.

"I think the cricket's the most important thing. We've got five days of important cricket ahead of us to worry about, and not worry about anything else."

Dravid admitted there was plenty of motivation to avoid another 4-0 series loss, like the one they suffered in England last year.

"We've got to show that we can fight back and we can play better cricket," he said.

"Now I know that results might not show it, but at least I thought in Melbourne we had our chances but we didn't take them.

"We were outplayed in Sydney badly, but we had our chances in Melbourne and we can take heart from that.

"There are certain things that I think we can take heart from and I think it's very important for us to try and definitely not go down the route of what happened in England."