Indian batting coach Vikram Rathour stated that India will stick to their established strategy of playing the second Test match against England in Vizag. In the first match, due to a lack of innovative shots in their batting style, the Indian team fell behind in the second innings, allowing the inexperienced England spin-bowling attack to dominate in Hyderabad.
After losing by 28 runs to England in the first of five Test match series, the Men In Blue are now preparing for the second match in Visakhapatnam. The team wants to correct the mistakes made in the previous match and reestablish control in home Tests.
Speaking to the media, Indian batting coach Vikram Rathour believes that adopting sweep strokes is not as simple as it appears and requires proper preparation. He agreed that reverse sweeps and sweeps may just open the door for batsmen to score some crucial extra runs, but the Indian team is coached to be ahead of the traditional cricket method, which primarily entails playing straight with their feet.
“It is not something that you can try, you need to be prepared. Of course, if you can add more shots to your game it is always beneficial you are right we play in a traditional way, and our strengths and strong areas are going straight using our feet we can add shots and score runs square of the wicket that is always a good addition,” Vikram Rathour said.
During the Hyderabad Test, the England team staged an iconic comeback, going from down by an innings on Day 3 to eventually defeating the home side on Day 4, thanks in large part to Ollie Pope’s game-changing 196 off 278 innings.
Indian Batters such as Shubhman Gill and Shreyas Iyer struggled significantly against English spinners such as Tom Hartley and Rehan Ahmed, fueling conjecture of a shift in Indian batting strategy.
Since India’s defeat, there has been talk of the Indian team adopting sweep strokes similar to the English batsmen, including reverse sweeps, to cope with the likes of Tom Hartley, who took 7 wickets in the Hyderabad Test.
The ability of English batsmen like Pope and Ben Duckett to get a hold of veteran Indian spinners like Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja with their sweep and reverse sweeps was the driving force behind this reversal. The England hitters coped efficiently with Indian spinners’ low-height deliveries with superbly timed sweep drives, leaving the Indian bowlers with no fast response to their tenacity.
