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Updated September 4th, 2018 at 17:02 IST

Gritless, Spineless, Characterless innings; Indïan batters can't play Swing, not even Spin!

England beat India by 60 runs in the fourth test match at Southampton to seal five-match Test series

Reported by: Suman Ray
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Neither their feet moved, nor their body or the mind and they succumbed like Zombies before the belligerant Gladiators with the Red Cherry.

The Rose Bowl disaster raises the question once again: How many Indian batsman can retain their position in the playing XI  on merit & on current form? Except for Virat Kohli perhaps none. 

It was a tale of another listless abject surrender by Indian batsmen: exposing the lack of  technique from the top order, dearth of skill & perseverance from the middle order & the absence of mind & doggedness from the lower middle & tail-enders.

Chasing 245 runs in fourth innings is not a Herculean job, but Indian batsmen with an uncanny knack of creating a cloud of self doubt and making a heavy weather of a modest target, collapsed like a house of cards.

India played an unfit Ravichandran Ashwin, who trying a bit too much found himself struggling to be even relevant on a turning wicket which fetched Moen Ali 9 wickets in the match.

The pacers did their job well and restricted England batsman to modest totals in both the innings. But a listless batting line up looked a pale shadow of their Nottingham heroics,  playing without any intent and purpose.

Both the openers technique or the lack of it was brutally exposed by English veterans -- James Anderson and Stuart Broad. If Murali Vijay was sent home unceremoniously, both  Shikhar Dhawan and KL Rahul looked in a hurry to jump the Q for a ticket back home.

Virat Kohli was rather unlucky to see Ali's vicious off-spin finding his gloves on way to short midwicket. 

It was a perfect stage for Ajinkya Rahane to wrest the initiative and play a vice-captain's innings and see the match through. But yet avain he showed why is he not considered a big match player. 

Youngster Rishabh Pant in a perennial IPL world, looked like wanting to finish off the target in just one shot, fell to a cleverly bowled delivery little outside the off stump.

Having lost the match and with it the series, India has also relinquished its numero uno position in Test Cricket, if not in ICC ranking but surely in the minds of cricket fans and lovers.

 

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Published September 2nd, 2018 at 23:52 IST

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