England picked up an unassailable 3-1 lead in the five-match Test series as India slumped to a 60-run defeat in the fourth Test at the Ageas Bowl in Southampton on Sunday. After keeping the series alive with a resounding win at Trent Bridge, the visitors came close to edging their counterparts but were let down by another shoddy batting display.
With Virat Kohli and co coming under-fire after another away Test series loss, Sourav Ganguly has raised questions over the teams batting ability.
“This batting lineup hasn’t been making runs for a long time now. If you look at India’s overseas performances from 2011 until now, they have lost every big series. When Virat Kohli is at the crease it seems that he is playing against totally different bowlers as compared to when the other batsmen are batting. I believe that the batting ability of the current players has gone down. There are a lot of reasons for this. Firstly, the players are short of confidence, whether you look at (Cheteshwar) Pujara or (Ajinkya) Rahane, you’ll find that four years ago, the latter was matching Kohli shot-by-shot in Adelaide which is not the case at the moment. The same goes for Pujara too,” the former India captain told.
Ganguly also added that both Shastri and Bangar have to be answerable for India’s shambolic performances. Shastri has to be accountable for the results while Bangar has to be answerable on why Kohli looks at ease while his teammates are struggling to score runs.
“Regarding Ravi Shastri, he has to be held accountable for the results along with Sanjay Bangar regarding why only one batsman is performing whereas others seem to have taken backward steps. Unless these questions are answered an overseas series win in the three countries looks impossible for India,” he added.
Ganguly also hinted that other members of the team needed to step up despite Kohli’s contributions.
“I can understand why Virat Kohli is saying what he is saying in the press conference because you still have to sound positive in such situations. But in the last 7 away Tests, India has lost five. Agreed that the Southampton Test was a close contest, but after Kohli got out the commentators started saying that India will lose the match. That is what happened and has been happening for quite some time now, match after match, innings after innings. Just taking 20 wickets won’t win you matches, you have to score runs as well,” he signed off.
