India’s head coach Gautam Gambhir has backed his bowlers to come good as the series progresses.
During the Headingley Test, a familiar tale followed when India were over-reliant on Jasprit Bumrah to do the heavy lifting in the bowling department. While the ace pacer obviously stepped up again, especially in the first innings, the team would have wanted more from other bowlers, who were wayward throughout the contest.
India’s head coach Gautam Gambhir has backed his bowlers to come good as the series progresses after their abysmal show in the first Test. He highlighted the importance of giving them match time, for most of them are inexperienced and young in their career.
“This bowling attack has one bowler with five Tests under his belt, one has four, one has played two and one hasn’t yet debuted. We will have to give them time. Earlier, we used to have four fast bowlers in the squad with an experience of more than 40 Tests. It doesn’t make such a big impact in one-day or T20 matches, but when you go to Australia, England or South Africa for Tests, experience matters. These are early days.”
While Krishna’s inexperience is understandable, India would have liked more from Mohammed Siraj and Shardul Thakur, given both have played here before. However, they looked nowhere close to their best, and Thakur wasn’t even trusted enough with the ball, especially in the first innings, where he bowled only six overs out of 100.4 by India.
When India arrived on England’s shores with a relatively inexperienced attack, the expectations weren’t high, but what transpired in the first Test was beyond acceptable. During the first innings, Jasprit Bumrah did the heavy lifting by bowling the second-most overs for his side and took five wickets for 83 runs.
However, Siraj went for 4.50 and took only two wickets, while Krishna took three wickets but conceded 6.40 runs per over, and Thakur had an economy rate of 6.30 without dismissing any batters. The non-Bumrah end collectively went for 5.43 in the first innings and took only five wickets, as England scored freely and reached near India’s first-innings total.
Later, during the second innings, Bumrah couldn’t take wickets, as English batters were over-cautious against him. While the overall run rate of the innings was 4.54, Bumrah went for only three runs per over, as England clearly didn’t want him to run through their batting unit.
However, other pacers were again ineffective, as Mohammed Siraj went wicketless in 14 overs, even if he bowled well in patches, and Krishna and Thakur were again expensive, conceding 6.10 and 5.10 runs per over, respectively. A few innocuous deliveries fetched wickets, but the overall control was missing, which is a big issue against this English side that plays aggressive cricket and disrupts lengths anyway.
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