India's bowling boosts title hopes

India lost as many games as Australia in the 50-over World Cup in 2015 and as many as Sri Lanka in the 2014 World T20. While both Australia and Sri Lanka have World Cup trophies to show for their efforts in those tournaments (both lost only one game each), India were left to rue their chances, for the only game they lost in each was a knockout.

Now India will start another world tournament as firm favourites. In the last two such events, they had some issues to address or hide right through, but that's not the case in now, so anything less than a podium finish will be disappointing.

Strength
If three of your top four batsmen are players of pedigree and are in great form, you're sorted on most days. In Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli and Suresh Raina, India have three top-quality T20 batsmen. In addition to their proven T20 record, both Rohit and Kohli are in the form of their lives. Both have the ability to not just score at a fair clip but also bat deep into the innings and finish off games.

Traditionally India's strength lay in their batting, and while that's still the case, the bowling is looking a lot more robust than it has been in the recent past, especially after the addition of fast bowlers Ashish Nehra and Jasprit Bumrah in the attack. The biggest shift has come in the first six overs, in which India used to leak runs earlier. Now, they are picking up wickets. In Hardik Pandya, India have a seam-bowling allrounder for pitches with a little bit of help for the seamers.

Once India start well, which is happening often lately, R Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja take control of the middle overs and further choke the opposition. Not to forget the availability of Yuvraj Singh and Raina as two spin options who are slightly better than part-timers. In short, MS Dhoni has three options for seaming conditions and four if the pitch is assisting spin or the opposition isn't comfortable against spin.

Weakness
While there isn't any glaring weakness in India's T20 team, there's definitely some scope for improvement in the lower middle order. India's top order has been masking the lack of hitting power from Nos. 5, 6 and 7. Dhoni is no longer the batsman who goes after the bowling right away, Yuvraj has just started to resemble his old self, and Pandya is untested against quality attacks. On most days, it won't come down to the lower order to save the day, but in case it happens, the line-up doesn't look as prepared as it should be. In this department, both Australia and South Africa score over the hosts. The dip in Raina's form is not a major worry at the moment, but if India are to win the World T20, he must recover soon. Another minor concern is the form of Bumrah and the fitness of Nehra. Since India have only three fast bowlers in the squad, they can't afford an injury or loss of form here.

X-factor
The World T20 is different from any bilateral series on many counts; the biggest is that you play each other only once, which presents a golden opportunity for an unknown commodity to slip under the radar. Most teams in the World T20 haven't played Bumrah and since it takes time to get used to his unorthodox action, he's likely to get away unscathed more often than not. And if Bumrah can bowl four good overs in most games, Dhoni will be breathing a lot easier. It's not just his action that gives him a head start but also the fact that he's fairly accurate. He's able to produce yorkers at will and has developed the legbreak variation of the slower delivery, which is always a good option in the death overs.