India’s upcoming tour of England has certainly got the Indian cricket fans and cricketers excited. Indian test players like Virat Kohli, Cheteshwar Pujara and Ishant Sharma have already suggested their intentions to prepare well in advance for the England series by playing county cricket.
Now after the players have expressed their intentions to perform well, India’s head coach Ravi Shastri has also made certain things clear before the tour begins. India’s tour of England begins on 3rd June with the limited overs format to be played before the five match Test rubber between England and India.
India lost the last Test series 3-1 in England despite winning the historic Lord’s Test. However, Virat Kohli and his men look to turn the fortunes around in the upcoming tour. India last won a Test series in England in 2007 under the captaincy of Rahul Dravid.
Ravi Shastri feels that playing the T20 and ODI series before the Test series will give the players sufficient time to get used to the conditions.
Shastri said, “(Former Australia captain) Michael (Clarke) and I had a chat earlier (today) that we (Indian team) will be there (in England) almost a month before the first Test match. We play some one-day cricket before the first Test match starts. You kick off the one-day games around 1st of July and the first Test starts August 1. That gives us that much more time (to prepare for Tests),”
Shastri was happy that the problem of tour planning has been talked about the BCCI and CoA. “To be fair to the BCCI and the CoA, those plans were (already) in place. It’s only when the new FTP kicks in in 2019, that’s when you can address those problems and they have been addressed,”
The Indian head coach has also acknowledged the team’s performance in South Africa where the team won the ODI series for the first time.
“Well before we went to South Africa, I told you clearly the next 15 months was going to define this Indian cricket team. What our boys did in South Africa makes me proud as a coach because there were 21 days of cricket and on each one of those 21 days, India competed.”
“On each one of those days in the Test series the pendulum swung from one side to other. 21 out of 21 days the boys competed; they were relentless. The one-day series we won after 25 years. And so from a coach’s point of view, you have to just stand up and say ‘well done, guys. Simply magnificent. You have raised the bar’,”
