India head coach Rahul Dravid is hopeful of fielding a full strength squad in ODIs, barring injuries, starting from January, with nine home ODI matches scheduled against Sri Lanka, New Zealand and Australia (three in each series) until March.

This comes after India lost the second ODI to Bangladesh by 5 runs to concede the series 2-0 with one more game to play on Saturday (December 10). India also lost 1-0 to New Zealand last month with two games being abandoned due to rain.

Earlier in January, India lost 3-0 in South Africa but managed to win the ODI series in England and West Indies by 2-1 and 3-0 respectively. So overall, it's not been a satisfactory year of ODI cricket away from home, and there is a concern of the team's health in the format ahead of next year's World Cup in October-November in India.

The focus on T20Is due to the T20 World Cup also meant that India had to rest its key players often for the ODI format and with added injuries there has been a lot of inconsistency in selection which has reflected in the performance as well. 

READ ALSO: Rohit Sharma, Deepak Chahar and Kuldeep Sen ruled out of 3rd ODI, confirms Rahul Dravid

Speaking to reporters in Dhaka during his post-match press conference, Dravid said, “I guess from our perspective, it has not been easy to play. We don't have full squad. Hopefully, from January, depending on injuries, we will get full squad to play home series. We have nine ODIs before IPL (3 vs NZ, 3 vs SL and 3 vs Aus) and hopefully, we will get to play a settled squad in those games,”

“In the last two years, we had prioritised T20s a lot as there were two World Cups. In the next 8-10 months, we will be prioritising ODI cricket. It is not easy to juggle three formats. Now, our white ball boys (specialists) will get some rest with Test matches being played,” he added.

(PTI INPUTS)