Kohli and India Dejected with 1st Test Defeat

After breaching the Gabba fortress, Virat Kohli’s men were stunned by Joe Root’s England in the First Test at Chennai.

England won the toss and elected to bat, getting off to a decent start with an opening partnership of 87 between Rory Burns and Dom Sibley. When the Indians dismissed both Burns and Dan Lawrence in quick succession, they would have thought they would be back in the contest, however bowling on a reasonably flat pitch against a in form batting line up was going to be a tough grind, and it proved to be so as the home side spent over two days on the field.

Weakened Spin Attack

There is no doubt that the loss of Ravindra  Jadeja to an injury on his left thumb is a huge, huge miss for Kohli and India as he provides them with runs with the bat, brilliance in the field and most importantly control with the ball, which is what Washington Sundar and Shahbaz Nadeem lacked despite Sundar scoring an unbeaten 87 in the first innings.

Sundar and Nadeem’s lack of consistency with the ball meant that India’s number one spinner  Ravichandran Ashwin had to bowl 55 of the 190 overs of England’s first innings, which is incredible but also exhausting.

There is no doubt that India may make changes for the second Test, but who will they go with? Kuldeep Yadav? The left-arm Chinaman bowler has played  just six Tests for India and has taken 24 wickets with an average of 12.24, or Rahul Chahar? A young promising Leg Break bowler from Rajasthan, who plays for Mumbai Indians in the IPL

It will most likely be Kuldeep playing in that Test, purely because his experience of taking bag fulls of wickets in white ball cricket, but it would be nice to see the young Leggy get a go in Test Cricket.

Batting

Shubman Gill looks a really good player as he showed in Australia and in the second innings, He and Rohit Sharma look like long term openers, certainly in the longer format, my only concern is Sharma playing left-arm spin. When he is defending, his front foot doesn’t always point towards where the ball pitched and in the second innings he was bowled by Jack Leach playing slightly down the wrong line.

Speaking about his technique, he also has a bit of a stiff front leg, which can be a little risky against the new ball and with someone bowling at 90mph and above, you will always be susceptible to the slightly fuller delivery.

As well as Dom Bess and Leach bowled, some of the batmen in India’s second innings were uncertain on whether to pay on the front or back foot, particularly against Leach. Take nothing away from Leach as he bowled beautifully in the second innings, but India could have at least a bit more positive against him and look to score rather than just survive. However, this is only the first Test so you would expect India to come out with more intent in the second Test.

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