The Lords and Oval wins have hastened pundits to put the team aside the best of the past
Team India’s win at The Oval on Monday Sept 7th was quite an achievement, coming after the humiliating defeat at Leeds. London has been a happy hunting city for India this series, the win at Lords was achieved with aplomb only to be sullied by the 78 all out at Yorkshire.
Half a century after the famous series clinching win at The Oval in 1971, Virat Kohli’s team attained the improbable. Wiping off a 99 run deficit and winning by 157 runs is a remarkable feat in Test cricket. The win was made possible by some stupendous batting performances from Rohit Sharma, who scored his first overseas century, Cheteshwar Pujara, KL Rahul, skipper Kohli and of course some rear-guard action by Shardul Thakur and Rishabh Pant.
Thakur, who was picked as one of the seam bowling replacements for Ishant Sharma and Mohd Shami, truly encapsulated the hunger for winning of the team by making a half century in each innings. It has to be recorded with pride that the Indian bowling unit, for the second time in the series, won by picking up 20 wickets in the match in not-so-friendly bowling conditions. The flat wicket did not turn much for the sole spinner in the Indian team - Ravindra Jadeja, or assist the seamers in any way. Its credit to Umesh Yadav in the 1st innings and a record breaking effort by Jasprit Bumrah in the 2nd innings which made the win possible. Bumrah became the fastest to reach 100 wickets in Tests in 24 Tests (overshadowing the legendary Kapil Dev, who reached the milestone in 25 Tests) and Jadeja and Siraj too pitched in with crucial wickets along with Thakur.
While the victory has been hailed on par with the best ever, it is too premature to compare Kohli’s team with the Windies of the late 70s and 80s or the Aussies of Steve Waugh and Ricky Ponting. Those teams’ legendary streak came with little or no blemish. The current India team having won the series against Australia down under and beating England at Home is on the cusp of attaining yet another away series victory. However the two huge reverses – the 36 all out at Adelaide and the 78 at Leeds will remain in the record books as blots on an otherwise marvellous seasons.
We should also put in perspective the opposition batting, that revolved around its skipper Joe Root and couple of experienced batsmen in the top order. They sure missed the services of Jos Buttler and the exuberance of Ben Stokes. England haven’t had a settled top-order, with the opening combination changing more frequently than the seasons, for quite some years now.
Not taking away the sheen from the stupendous performances leading to the India victory, it surely speaks about the resistance or the strength of the opposition. For all those comparing the team to the all-round world beaters of Clive Lloyd and the Aussies, India had a great win, but they aren’t anywhere close to being there, yet!
Good analysis...
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ReplyDeleteDifferent eras of cricket and generations are incomparable. Every victory is sweet and every loss hurts. Learnings are there in both wins and losses. We are probably going through an era in cricket where Test match at an overall level is losing its sheen - with quick scoring, lack of application coming to the forefront and the word patience getting quickly disconnected with Test Cricket!! Although I am happy that across all teams in Test Cricket bowlers are playing a huge role in their respective team's victories,the question to ask is - Are bowlers being made more lethal than they actually are due to lacklustre batting by International batsmen across the globe in Test Cricket!!
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ReplyDeleteGood one venkat
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