After losing the third Test of the ongoing Border-Gavaskar Trophy, former India head coach Ravi Shastri didn't shy away from calling the Rohit Sharma-led side 'overconfident'. It took an interesting turn when the Indian skipper hit back in the press conference ahead of the fourth Test and called Shastri an outsider. However, Shastri's criticism of the skipper's decisions didn’t end there.
After India’s struggles with the ball on the first day of the fourth Test at Ahmedabad, Shastri once again took a dig at the Indian team and questioned the captain on the necessity of taking a new ball towards the end of the day’s play. He believes that the visiting team got a lot of advantage because of that, which eventually shifted the momentum towards Australia’s favour.
Shastri also stated that India lost the plot at that very moment as players like Umesh Yadav and Mohammed Shami aren’t young enough to trouble the Aussie batters with a second new ball. He believes the bowlers had got tired after the day's play and therefore, weren't in a state to effectively use the new ball to put the opposition in a spot.
“I think India lost the plot last night. Taking the new ball was not the right thing to do considering Umesh is 35, Shami is not getting any younger. They had bowled a lot. They were getting tired. A shorter burst with two overs is fine. But taking the new ball as early as that let Australia get away,” Shastri said on commentary during Day two as quoted by Hindustan Times.
As a captain, you've got to put your thinking cap on, and marshall your resources: Shastri
Given that the surface at the Narendra Modi Stadium is great for batters to dominate, Ravi Shastri believes that this is the time Rohit Sharma needs to prove himself as a captain and use his resources well. He also stated that the Mumbai-born cricketer has the talent to do well but needed to be exposed to batting tracks.
Shastri called the ongoing Test a learning curve for Sharma as for most part of his captaincy stint, India have played on rank turners which take a match away in three days. The batting pitch in Ahmedabad and the conditions thereon are expected to teach Sharma new lessons of Test captaincy.
“As a captain, things have moved fast during his tenure. He has been captaining on turning tracks where things get over in three days. So, this is a big learning curve. When you play on a surface like this where wickets are hard to come, the batting is good. As a captain, you've got to put your thinking cap on, and marshall your resources. It's one thing captaining in India, one thing captaining overseas and one thing captaining in India on good tracks like these. He has all the skills, this is the exposure that he needs,” the 60-year-old stated.
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