India’s Ajinkya Rahane believes that 20-30 runs from the lower order can make a huge impact on the outcome of a match in the upcoming Test series in England.
India vice-captain Ajinkya Rahane on Monday spoke at length about the hard work that Indian fast bowlers have been putting in in the nets – not only with the ball, but with the bat in hand as well, ahead of the first Test against England at Trent Bridge on Wednesday.
Team India’s last two defeats on the road that came in Adelaide and Southampton were heavily linked to the failure of India’s lower order to contribute with the bat. In those matches the top six batters of India outscored their opposite numbers, whereas the lower order failed to match their counterparts with the bat in hand.
Out of the six fast bowlers in the Indian squad, only Umesh Yadav and Shardul Thakur average more than 10 in first-class cricket. If things remain like this, there can be a situation where India may need to drop either one of their all-rounders or a pace bowler in order to play an extra specialist batter. To avoid such a situation, an added focus is being paid to enhance the batting skills of the tailenders.
“When we came here to England after the WTC final, after that we started our practice in Durham, our fast bowlers were eager to bat in the nets everyday and were asking our batting coach [that] they wanted to bat [for] 10-12 minutes which is a very good sign,”
Rahane said.
India’s previous tour of England back in 2018 was also marred by their lower order batting woes, while on the contrary, England had services of players like Sam Curran and Chris Woakes, who made match-winning contributions batting down the order.
In the absence of Hardik Pandya, who was India’s most prolific all-round option in the 2018 Test series in England, Shardul Thakur will be the closest to being India’s only seam bowling all-rounder this time around.
“Shardul can bat and you saw him do it in Australia. They all want to contribute, even 20-30 runs in the end and that matters a lot. It is a good sign that they are going to the net and batting because the results come later on,”.
Rahane added
India will be desperate to win a Test series in England for the first time since 2007, especially when they are high on confidence after their historic Test series win in Australia.
The first Test will be at Trent Bridge from August 4 at 3.30 pm IST.
