Former Indian Test opener Aakash Chopra criticised India’s batting after they were bundled out for 76 runs in the run chase of 202 against England in the third T20I at Trent Bridge, Nottingham on Tuesday. All the Indian batters failed to get going as the visitors kept losing wickets at regular intervals.
No Indian batter was even able to cross the 15-run mark in the run-chase. The visitors found themselves tottering at 63-7 with all of their specialist batters back in the dressing room.
Jofra Archer and Josh Tongue wrecked havoc as they returned with three and four wickets respectively. India suffered a 125-run loss, which is their biggest defeat in T20Is.
“The headline story is: What has happened to the Indian batting? Believe it or not, we were 41/2 at one stage and got all out for 76. We lost five wickets in the Powerplay. Harshit Rana’s batting came in the Powerplay. We folded up in 11.4 overs,” Aakash Chopra said on his YouTube Channel.
“76 all out from 41/2, it is just not right, and this is not happening for the first time. The problem is that it is happening repeatedly. We fell short massively while chasing middling totals in Ireland. You can lose, but this was like a follow-on in T20 cricket. A 125-run loss is absolutely mindboggling,” he observed.
Meanwhile, Vaibhav Sooryavanshi was dismissed cheaply after scoring 13 runs by his RR teammate Jofra Archer. Chopra said there will be inconsistency in Sooryavanshi’s game as he always plays aggressively.
“Vaibhav hit sixes for sure, but got out after that. This has happened twice, and you will get this with Vaibhav. This inconsistency is quite likely to happen because he is a batter like that. He hit a six against Jofra Archer and then a six against Josh Tongue, and then there was a short ball, and he got out to it. This can happen,” he said.
The former Delhi cricketer highlighted that Shreyas Iyer and Ishan Kishan had soft dismissals as they found fielders in the deep.
“It wasn’t going to be an easy job if Abhishek Sharma gets out when you are trying to chase 200 runs. Ishan Kishan hit a pull and found the fielder in the deep. Then Shreyas Iyer played a flick, and he also found the fielder in the deep. We can say that they are slightly soft dismissals, as you found the fielders in the deep, but the truth is that someone will have to take responsibility to bat deep into the innings,” Chopra observed.
The fourth T20I between England and India will be played at Bristol, County Ground on Thursday.
