Very rarely, we see even pitches in India and the most powerful board made sure that there was even contest between bat & ball. Sanjay Manjrekar heaped praise on Indian national cricket team. Sanjay Manjrekar said that India can also win in their backyard without producing rank turners.
England national cricket team were a bit too much over-confident while interacting with the media. ECB’s director Rob Key must have a word with the coaching staff as due to this embarrassing score-line of 1-4, England’s chances of making it to ICC World Test Championship (WTC 2023-25) cycle have taken a bad habit as the Britishers now are placed on 8th position with a percentile of 17.5.
England made sure that India prepared better pitches- Sanjay Manjrekar
Sanjay Manjrekar was having an interaction with ESPNCricinfo. Sanjay Manjrekar pointed out that India changed their strategy by not preparing rank turners after the defeat in the 1st Test match. Sanjay Manjrekar also stated that England beating India in the 1st Test match was the biggest take away for the visitors.
“England made sure that India prepared better pitches. Better pitches in the sense that pitches that didn’t turn as much, because of what they did in Hyderabad. I think that was a fantastic win, and that’s the big takeaway for England in the way they beat India in the very first exposure on a typical turner,” said Sanjay Manjrekar
“You saw the Indian spinners for the first time rattled in a home series in the way the England batters played, and 420 in the second innings by England on that pitch just made sure that India didn’t again venture making another turner like that,” he added.
Delight for India
The Men in Blue showed to the World Cricket that they can also win without the likes of the veteran batters: Cheteshwar Pujara & Ajinkya Rahane which was the biggest positive for the richest board. Indian national cricket team’s head coach Rahul Dravid in one of his interviews stated that the chief selector Ajit Agarkar wanted youngsters to excel against a quality Britain side rather than going back to Pujara & Rahane.
It won’t be wrong to say that Yashasvi Jaiswal & Shubman Gill have sealed their batting slots for the upcoming Test series against Bangladesh & New Zealand. It would be interesting to see how the Yashasvi & Gill fare in the upcoming IPL 2024 edition as both would be competing for the opening slot for ICC T20 World Cup 2024 which is slated to take place in June 2024 in Caribbean & USA.