Was second Inning declared at right time or late....

you know what a county captain once said, "I dont play cricket according to the weather" . That is much a cliche now. If rain would not have come down and then india declared for 500 on night of day 3, the run rate required would have been less than 3 runs an over. I know scoring 500 is not probable but with the time in hand and series up for grabs , it was important to bat them out , so that they go out there single-mindedly to save the match . Now dhoni kept 170 overs for the bowlers to bowl them out i think it was safe as prediction was "not heavy rain".I think it was extremely important for the pressure to be put on later in the innings.

yes i agree with you dhoni should have declared the innings much earlier than he did. maybe he wanted to get to his half century that is the reason he did not declare early. it was very clear that it will rain on the fifth day only the extent to which it would rain was not clear. but dhoni who is said to be a proactive captain just did not make sure that india had enough time if the rains decided to play spoilsport. i think 525 should have been the target. there was no way new zealand would have achieved that with the bowling lineup that we have.

I too think so. Declaration came a bit late. You can never play with nature. Nature can always play a spoil sport. It happened so in Wellington.

Ya .you are right. But the biggest winning chases ( like we did against england) would be sitting on the INDIAN s mind before declaring. It should have been a win for INDIA. but , what to do , the picture for DHONI and co would have looked different in the field while they were batting . The series win after 41 years is an accomplishment. We can take this draw as a consolation for NEW ZEALAND.