Ricky Ponting And Stuart Broad Call Out Shubman Gill's Tactical Flaws On 2nd Day Of Manchester Test As England Grind India In Old Trafford

IND vs. ENG: England's dominant display of batting in the second Test of the ongoing Anderson-Tendulkar Trophy series has put them in the driver's seat of the Manchester Test. India were already plagued with injury issues before coming into the Manchester Test, but now they have bigger problems to address considering how the England openers batted on the second day of the Old Trafford Test. India ended the first innings with 358 runs on the board, but at this point in time, it doesn't seem to be enough.

Ricky Ponting and Stuart Broad Slam India's Tactics

England openers gave Shubman Gill's Team India a bitter taste of what 'Bazball' is all about. Zak Crawley and Ben Duckett scored 166 runs for the first wicket while trying to knock off India's first innings total of 358 odd runs. The Indian bowlers did find some success in the final session of the play as Ravindra Jadeja dismissed Zak Crawley and debutant Anshul Kamboj sent Ben Duckett back to the hut.

Former Australia skipper Ricky Ponting has questioned Shubman Gill's move of giving the new ball to debutant Anshul Kamboj. "I think they were tactically off as well. Kamboj shouldn't have taken the new ball. I didn't like that from the start. Five of Duckett's first six boundaries were behind square leg, so tactically they were wrong," said Ponting while speaking on Sky Sports Cricket.

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Former English pacer Stuart Broad was also unimpressed by India's strategies. Broad also went to the extent of calling India's performance on Day 2 unacceptable. "Really poor. When your batters get you a score that is slightly above par in the conditions they had to bat in, you've got a responsibility as a bowling group to put the opposition team under pressure. It was unacceptable at Test match level," said the ex-English pacer.

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All or Nothing Situation for Team India in Manchester Test

With three matches of the Anderson-Tendulkar Trophy series done and dusted, England already have the upper hand with two wins. The Manchester Test is a do-or-die affair for the Indian cricket team and they need to win it at any cost if they want to stay alive in the series. India last won a Test series in England back in 2007 and since then, they haven't experienced much luck on English soil.