England in India 2024-25 : The Pataudi Trophy

[prasen9]

Many spinners have had 1-2 tests or one series where they have gotten tons of wickets in spinning pitches in India. However, they have been duds in their careers. I think the likes of Bashir, Hartley, etc. will be mediocre at best.

But, of course, I have said Bashir bowled well today and congratulations to him for getting 8 wickets in the match.

I applaud people when they perform and I call out players when they do not. I do not keep quiet when some people get injured and jump on injuries to other players. I do not stay hidden when my favorite players fail and suddenly appear when they score runs. I try to call a spade a spade. I do have my favorites. But, if they fail, I will call for them to be dropped whenever they fail for a period of time (Yashasvi, Sarfaraz). And, increasingly Jurel and Pant. I had called Jurel to be in the team right from the first test or second test - we can check. Kumar said it would not happen. And, he was right.

But, we cannot reward failures like Gill in tests, like SkAY in ODIs. That sends a terrible message. That tells the others in line after them that we absolutely have no confidence in them. That they are so much worse than Gill scoring 30s that they should not be given that spot. We don't even have confidence in them to score more than 33. We need to show confidence in our juniors. Keeping Gill via nepotism is not doing that. We need to truly back our juniors who perform. Realistically, we could have 2-3 competitive test teams. So, sticking on to non-performers is something we do not need to do. Maybe a smaller country like West Indies or Sri Lanka will do. We will find a replacement for Gill in 2-3 series and nobody will remember. See Pujara. Kumar wanted Pujara to be back for good reason. I am confident in replacements we have and our depth of talent in the batting side. On the bowling side, the same can be said for our spinners. Wrt pacers, we do not do a good job nurturing talent. So, kick out all non-performers. Old and young.

I have called for Rahane and Pujara to be dropped from tests. I think I called for Kohli to be dropped too but now he has returned to form in tests and deserves to be there as long as he is scoring. And, I have called for seniors such as Rohit, Kohli, Jadeja, and Rahul to be dropped from T20.

[SaniaFan]

Agree with most but predicting mediocrity to a young bowler who picked 12 wickets in his first two matches and one who does not have body of work in FC matches seems like an eye test to me

[Kumar]

Man, they proved me totally wrong. i am absolutely happy i got all those tomatoes on the face.

I was expecting our batsman to fail, but they delivered when it mattered.

Jurel has been a revelation this series. Is he better than Sarfaraz as a batsman?

[Prem]

Fantastic win for the team after being far behind nearing end of day 2. 177/7 in response to 353 and looking like conceding a lead of 125-150.
Firstly, Jurel with Kuldeep and tail played well to curtail the lead to 46 and than our spinners bowled exceptionally well to bundle out England. Chase was tense after we lost 5 quick wickets (4 for 21 with Patidar, Jaddu and Sarfaraz following Rohit).
Again Jurel came in and calmed things and got the score board moving after Jadeja and Gill had gone ultra defensive before lunch.
Gill played solid and alongwith Jurel didn’t give any chances and looked comfortable to take us home and a series win. Good positive start from Rohit and Yash to start us on a positive note.

[Kumar]

What impressed me was how he picked length. He was so fast at making the right decision. You see his trigger movement – this was at the start of the partnership on a wide ball – but he’s so good at getting back and forward and making the right decision at the right time for that ball.

Interesting insight from Cook.
https://www.eurosport.com/cricket/india ... tory.shtml

He does kind of bring an interesting perspective on Jadeja as well.

[prasen9]

How can Rohit even think of leading this team after getting stumped in this chase? Shameless guy who just excels in using colorful language on the field.

Edit: looks like he was caught behind. Maybe stumped too. My feeling remains the same regardless.

I am still waiting for a similar denounciation of Jadeja's shot which was really the worst in the inning. If we want to kick out the old guys irrespective of performance, we should start with Jadeja. Why? Because we have lots of good replacements for him. Axar, Saurabh, Mulani, ... They may never reach the heights of Jadeja but while calling for Rohit's ouster, we are not doing it on the basis of whether the replacement can be a Rohit.

To be absolutely clear, I don't want Jadeja to be dropped from the test team. I admire Jadeja. I pick on him to show the double standards people have here. Nor do I want Kohli or Ashwin to be dropped as long as they are performing. I am just calling out the hypocricy of those who use age to call for the older generation to be kicked out and criticize some people at the drop of a hat but nare a word when their favorite fails more badly or gets injured for that matter.

If we want to be agist, we should create a retirement age and drop people after that. That would be stupid but at least that is fair. If we want to go by performance, all the four seniors have performed fine in the last year. Rohit is borderline but reasonably acceptable as an opener where we should expect a tad less especially abroad. Kohli, Jadeja, and Ashwin have been fine.

I quite enjoy and marvel at James Anderson, who is 41. How he has maintained his body and fitness is exemplary. He was the best fielder and took a fabulous catch. More power to him. But, not in Dharamsala.

[Atithee]

Some positive talk from Rohit. Hope it’s not just lip service:

Rohit: 'We will give opportunity only to players who have that hunger to play:
https://www.espncricinfo.com/story/rohi ... hi-1422711

On Gill:

A Shubman Gill innings with echoes of Dravid and Pujara
https://www.espncricinfo.com/story/shub ... ra-1422755

[Atithee]

Interesting insight from Cook.
https://www.eurosport.com/cricket/india ... tory.shtml

Can’t access in the US. Would like to read it. I’ll see if I can find it another way.

Is it this one? Cook was known to be Jadeja’s bunny but I think he’s right in this analysis.
https://www.indiatoday.in/sports/cricke ... 2024-02-26

[prasen9]

Of course, Rohit is absolutely right. We need to only encourage people who are hungry to play for the country and in general play. That shows up in attitude in the field. So, unless Ishan absolutely lights up the IPL, we should go with others. And, no Ishan for tests. Jurel has earned his cap and done excellently well in trying conditions.

[Atithee]

Man, they proved me totally wrong. i am absolutely happy i got all those tomatoes on the face.

I was expecting our batsman to fail, but they delivered when it mattered.

Jurel has been a revelation this series. Is he better than Sarfaraz as a batsman?

Looks like you didn’t read my earlier question to you in this thread. I can now say, “I told you so.”

This is what I wrote on Saturday Feb 24 before the play even started, I think:

Kumar, what’s gone into you? You’ve been so negative even before the series started. Now you’ve already declared the match lost. In the last match also every single day, you declared a loss. The fact of the matter is that we should have been up 3-0. We had no business losing the first match. We may yet lose this match, but your daily proclamation is strange. There’s still a lot of the match left and lots can happen.

[Atithee]

This is part of my dissatisfaction with Rohit.

55 - Rohit Sharma's score in the chase is his highest in the fourth innings in Tests. He only had one 50-plus score in all first-class cricket in the fourth-innings before this - 52 against Australia in the 2021 Sydney Test.

Source: Cricinfo

[arjun2761]

This was a quality win for India after looking likely losers after day 2.

In the final innings chase, most of the credit is going (as it should) to Gill and Jurel because they batted under pressure but I think the opening stand by Rohit and Jaiswal was equally critical to the win.

[Kumar]

@Athitee, i was trying to act like it never happened .
Would u all believe that i thought that Ashwin was due for 5 wickets In the second innings.

I did not expect our batsman to do this well. Gill was a pleasant surprise and I hope this second innings boost his confidence. Still Jury is out until he can bat in SEN countries(believe that he will do well in Australia). Needs to work on his technical shortcomings

[Atithee]

^^@Kumar—

[indiansportsfan]

Gill was already a match winner the last time we toured Australia, and he also contributed to our solitary test win in RSA. The place he had a really tough time was in ENG, and I think that his relative success in RSA and new found confidence will help him do better in ENG as well.