Indian cricket's fielding struggles stem from a historical focus on batting/bowling, inconsistent training, cultural emphasis on academics over sports, and selection policies sometimes favoring specialists over athletic all-rounders, leading to lapses in concentration, technique, and fitness compared to top fielding nations like Australia/NZ, though recent years have seen improvement with talents like Jadeja/Kohli, yet consistency remains a challenge.
The dry grounds and humid conditions are also reasons for poor fielding.
Irrespective of the other factors, the players need to be physically fit to be able to run, jump, skid and bend to stop the ball. They need to train in fielding along with batting and bowling.
As long as we concentrate only on batting and bowling the success rate is not going to change.
By the way, if the stat says a decade old record or 20 year record was broken, it doesn't necessarily mean our fielding was good earlier.
Pitches were made to suit our spinners and if you look at the history, some spinners from other countries also had success on our grounds.
This is just my observation.
Cheers..
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