Birmingham loss: Lacklustre, unthreatening bowling attack let India down  

Lacklustre. Insipid. Unthreatening. These adjectives haven’t been associated with the Indian Test bowling attack for several years now. And yet, on Tuesday, for the third time in as many overseas Tests this year, India failed to defend a target, this time as mountainesque as 378.

More than the two losses in Johannesburg and Cape Town in January, when South Africa hunted down 240 and 212 respectively on slightly dubious surfaces with some comfort, the seven-wicket drubbing at the hands of new-look England will be particularly hard to digest. Having done all the running for the first three days and well placed to convert a 2-1 advantage into a 3-1 score-line in a series that started last August despite losing their last seven second-innings wickets for 92, India were given nary a sniff by an England side that has lent new meaning to attacking cricket.

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That pretty much the same bowling group – Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Shami, Mohammed Siraj and Shardul Thakur – have been part of all three defeats should worry Rahul Dravid, whose early days as head coach have been anything but encouraging, especially in Test cricket. Since Dravid took over in November last year, India have won four (three at home) and lost three (all away) of eight Tests played, their World Test Championship hopes hanging by a slender thread after the latest loss pushed them down to No. 4 in the league standings.

Dravid will be the first to admit that a percentage of the blame for this latest loss must be apportioned to the support staff of which he is the boss. With Bumrah in his first Test as captain in a stand-in capacity after Rohit Sharma tested COVID-positive, he would have looked for assistance both on the field from the senior players and from the dressing room, with Dravid and bowling coach Paras Mhambrey as his go-to men.

It’s unclear what the discussions around India’s strategy were when they set out in quest for 10 English wickets on the fourth afternoon. It shouldn’t have pertained to falling back on the defensive reasonably early. It most certainly shouldn’t have included a negative, potentially run-denying over-the-wicket outside leg line from Ravindra Jadeja, the lone specialist spinner with offie R Ashwin again sacrificed for a fourth paceman. Whatever India’s plans might have been, they were buried under an avalanche of runs by England’s two most prolific batsmen of this year, Joe Root and Jonny Bairstow.

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Much like India, England too have a new leadership group in Ben Stokes and coach Brendon McCullum. Seeking to sever links with an inglorious past, the two positive individuals have impressed upon the team the need to shed inhibitions and approach the sport with aggression and intent that is carefree rather than careless, with the term ‘Bazball’ used to describe their attitude. England had served notice of their intentions with three remarkable run-chases against New Zealand in the month leading up to the final Test of the interrupted series against India, but few would have bargained for the ridiculous ease with which they hunted down their highest ever successful chase in Test cricket.

True, the pitch was still excellent for batting even on the final day, with the rain of the preceding days and the marked absence of the sun precluding the potential wear-and-tear expected on day five. Agreed, there was no flow to the proceedings with an errant batch of Duke’s balls going out of shape far too often for the bowlers to ‘work’ on the red cherry. Yet, there is no excuse for going at 4.93 runs per over for the duration of England’s second innings, or at 5.12 during the match-clinching unbroken fourth-wicket stand of 269 between the Yorkshire pair of Root and Bairstow.

Root now has 11 Test hundreds since the beginning of 2021 while Bairstow has scored as many hundreds – six – in his last eight Tests as he did in his first 79. The calmness with which they approached what by all accounts was a tall order spoke to the belief, confidence and mood in the English camp, and the clear definition of roles and approach that has been handed down from the top.

Where England’s middle-order, expertly marshalled by Root, has been in peak form, India’s top and middle has, with the glorious exception of Rishabh Pant, looked undercooked and short of imagination, not helped by Virat Kohli’s sustained horror run that fetched scores of 11 and 20. Root averages upwards of 60 in the last 18 months; Kohli’s corresponding number is just over 29. It can be safely said that they are no longer in the same plane batting-wise. Truth to tell, no one is in the same plane as Root, though Bairstow might have something to say about it.

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India’s other big concern in the middle order is Shreyas Iyer’s susceptibility against the short ball. It’s unlikely that other teams will not have taken note of his extreme vulnerability and unless he works assiduously towards rectifying that anomaly – why he hasn’t already done so is a mystery – he might soon find himself on the outer looking in.

The batting will gather shape and substance when Rohit and KL Rahul return for the next Test series, in Bangladesh in December, but there will need to be a serious rethink about the attitude, if not composition, of the bowling unit. Thakur seems to be running on empty and Siraj is short on confidence as much as ideas, thus putting immense responsibility on the broad but overworked shoulders of Bumrah and Shami. The depth of India’s pace stocks is still intact but the time might be nigh to cast the net beyond Thakur in particular. What Dravid and Rohit wouldn’t give for a bowling-fit Hardik Pandya to be available for Test selection!

Also read: India vs England: Dravid satisfied with team’s preparation for one-off Test

The temptation to write this defeat as a one-off has to be tempered by the reality that in truth, this isn’t a result in isolation, the South Africa losses being cases in point. The buck won’t stop with the boys alone; there will be scrutiny of Dravid too. In his capacity as India ‘A’ and Under-19 coach, he could espouse his ‘development of players’ cause, but as head coach of the senior team, it’s results alone that will define his tenure.