It is real and it is staring us right on the eyes. Indian cricket’s lower order problem. This has become serious problem off late. The Indian lower order are absolute mug with the bat. It is better if they are made to stand in a line and the bowler bowl just one delivery to get all of them out. Terrible is the batting ability of the tailenders. For a side aspiring to be world beaters like Australia or the West Indies, this glaring problem must be addressed with immediate urgency.
The Indian lower order is absolute mug with the bat
The Indian lower order is manned by such eminent personalities like Jasprit Bumrah, Ishant Sharma and Mohammed Shami. Chahal and Kuldeep in the shorter formats. Replacements being Siraj, Natarajan, Rahul, Deepak, Kumar, Shardul and a few others. Except for Kumar and Shardul, the rest are incapable of batting for a period of time. This is a severe cause for concern. Around the world, teams have got bowlers who can hold their own at the crease. Take the case of Nathan Lyon. He fought with Chris Martin for the tag of worst number 11. Now, he is more than capable of scoring 30s and 40s with relative ease. We all know about the quality English tail possess.
Australian bowlers can all bat. In the sense, they may not be able to score 50s and 100s consistently but they are more than capable of scoring 20s and 30s. So can the New Zealand and South African bowlers.
A cursory glance at the Indian fast bowlers in the current squad on their tour of England, there are multiple no.11s. The recent WTC finals is a case in point. The Indian bowlers were unable to score runs. A combined aggregate of 50-60 runs in both the innings would have been the difference between a loss and a draw. However, the situation in the Indian team is that if they are 7 down, it is all down.
Not much is expected of the lower order
Bumrah & Shami are indispensable for the team’s plan. As such they are expected to play in all the games if they are not injured or rested. Hence it is necessary for them to improve their batting. Shami can hit but that is not what is expected. Bumrah can neither hit nor can he hold the bat. All that they are expected to do is to improve their batting sufficiently enough to be able to bat for 15-17 overs and contribute 20-25 runs. This is all the more vital if a batter is at the other end.
Far too many losses comes to mind because of the lower order’s inability with the bat. 2 tests in England in 2018, WTC finals, a couple of tests in South African and New Zealand. Agreed it is not the job of the bowlers to score runs. It is the job of the batter to score sufficient runs and help the bowlers to defend that score. When batter are not expected to take wickets, why are bowlers expected to score runs? Valid indeed. The reason why batter are not expected to take wickets but the bowlers are expected to bat is multiple.
One, during the course of a day, 90 overs or 50 overs or 20 overs, only 4 or at the maximum 5 bowlers will be able to bowl adequate number of overs to be able to get wickets. Batter are expected to make life difficult for the bowlers. As such, bowlers will have to keep running to pick up wickets.
Prediction for the India vs England series
Some of the former greats have predicted for India to win the series against England. Gavaskar has predicted 4-0 or 3-1 in India’s favour. Michael Vaughan 3-1 for India and quite a few others almost similar scoreline.
“In case you have a situation where the weather is going to be a factor, then I think India will win 3-1, but I think India will still go on to win, because England is now a very depleted side, and their batting, as we saw in the series against New Zealand, is being brittle,” Gavaskar said
How ridiculous have all these predictions have come in the past is well known. Yet, these cricketers continue to predict the scoreline. Before 2018 tour of England, everyone thought that India will win comfortably. Some even said that India will humiliate England in their own country. What happened at the end is quite to the contrary. It was England who humiliated India. The score was 4-1 in England’s favour.
Indian batting completely came apart. Who is to say that the same will not happen this time around? Afterall, Pujara, Kohli and Rahane, over the last 4 years are in outrageous form. With Rahul at the top of the order who is still unproven at the test level, there is every bit of a chance that the score will be repeated. It is better for all the former players to not predict anything because they don’t really know.