India skipper Virat Kohli cautioned against jumping into conclusions over the batting failures in the narrow Edgbaston Test defeat and urged his batsmen to show composure initially as a batting unit in the second game starting at Lord’s on Thursday.
“We should not judge so fast, jump into conclusions,” he said on Wednesday. “As a team, we keep patience. We don’t judge so fast. We don’t see any pattern to (the failures). As far as wickets falling in a heap is concerned, it’s not about technique, it is more of a mental aspect.
“It depends on how you think about it after the dismissal. There must be a clear plan on how to face the first 20-30 balls; more often than not that plan does not involve aggression. There we need some composure. As a batting unit we have discussed that.
“From outside it looks very bad, especially it is Test cricket and we are playing in England, where it is anyway difficult (due to seaming conditions). But we only need to bring down the margin of error. Beyond that we don’t need to worry too much.”
India’s top-order batsmen Murali Vijay, Shikhar Dhawan and KL Rahul as well as No 5 Ajinkya Rahane are under pressure after they all flopped, negating Kohli’s brilliant 149 in the first innings and top-score of 51 in the second.
The Edgbaston Test was the third occasion when Virat Kohli’s brilliant century as skipper went in vain, after his second-innings 141 against Australia at Adelaide on the 2014-15 tour and the 153 in the second Test at Centurion against South Africa in January too ended in losses.
