Indian captain Virat Kohli kept his consistency after losing yet another toss, in the second match of the ongoing series where the first Test match was called off without any result! Ahead of the second Test, England suffer a major setback when Stuart Broad is ruled out of the second Test along with series due to the injury! The host captain won the toss and decided to field first in the second test match. Where after losing the toss, India's hope was once again on the opening pair to give a good start as in the previous test match and both the openers did the same, due to the brilliant batting, the Indian team added 126 runs for the first wicket!
A brilliant start, India scored 276 for the loss of 3 wickets at the end of day's play, which included Rohit Sharma's knock of 83 runs to Lokesh Rahul's dependable century! At the end of the day, the wicket of Virat Kohli had indicated the return of the host! The game on the first day was completely in India's favor and it seemed that India would probably score 550 runs by the end of the first innings when they started the second day's play!
The second day’s play had just begun and KL Rahul had just added 2 more runs in his first day innings! When the England bowler showed him the way back! India’s score was 2 for 267 at one time but due to the deadly bowling of England, India’s batsman scored only 364 runs in the first innings!
From Cheteshwar Pujara to Ajinkya, captain Virat Kohli's batting disappointed everyone! The poor performance of the batsmen after a good start will definitely raise questions somewhere! England's most successful bowler James Anderson took 5 wickets and stopped India on a low score! Where India's last 8 wickets could add only 97 runs! Even small innings of Rishabh Pant and Jadeja did not succeed in taking India's score beyond 400! There would have been something else if India's batting had a batsman like Ashwin.
On Ashwin not being selected, Pakistan bowler Danish Kaneria says,
“I think India have made a mistake by not playing Ravichandran Ashwin. You needed a bowler like Ashwin at Lord’s. He could have given you wickets and also could have scored runs down the order. He could have been a key figure for the Indian team in this Test match. Jadeja contains runs well but Ashwin is a wicket-taking bowler,” Danish Kaneria opined.
“No doubt all the Indian bowlers are highly capable of picking wickets. But looking at the pitch and conditions, I feel Ashwin should have played. Many are saying that India has played an unbalanced team and we will get to know more when they bowl,” Danish Kaneria concluded
Where on the other hand former India batsman VVS Laxman has to say about Ashwin not being in the team,
“Ashwin gets that variety in the bowling attack and has got an abundance of experience,” VVS Laxman said. “It is clear from what Virat Kohli said in Nottingham that he wants to continue with this template. I think it is clear that Ashwin will have to wait for his time. If Ashwin isn’t playing in these conditions, I don’t see him getting in the XI.”
