I wouldn’t put it as a worry – Dinesh Karthik’s hard-hitting assessment of India’s batting

Team India had a decent start to the second innings but then fizzled away into a show of mediocrity except for Shubman Gill, who blasted a century while in the first innings it was Yashasvi Jaiswal who got the job done with an incredible 200.

In the first Test as well, the Indian batters had their own shares of struggles while trying to brave the English bowlers that eventually led to their slump in the second innings. In a conversation with Harsha Bhogle on Cricbuzz, Dinesh Karthik opened up on the fact that India’s recent batting displays have been more of a mental blockade than technical flaws.

Karthik said, “I wouldn’t put it as a worry only because only if they were getting out technically and there is no time to improve on that, then it becomes a problem. I think it’s a mental issue here. Their coach is one of the greatest examples of what it is to play long and I am sure that he is giving them advice.”

He further added, “For Dravid it may be slightly frustrating as well. He and Vikram Rathour must be thinking why are we losing wickets in Test cricket. E because I would be worried if they are not batting well. They are getting set, They are batting well but then they are giving away wickets to fall which definitely shouldn’t be.”

Karthik continued, “One thing that they need to understand. A lot of these players play white ball cricket. Hence, they have a lot more strokes and hence they will play a lot more shots. With shot making, you know that comes the natural fact that you will get dismissed a lot more. Understandable but for me they are getting out to soft dismissals. Things that are against the run of play, nothing much happening, falling to field basically, for example to KS Bharat, the way he pulled a short ball straight to mid-on, Axar Patel to Ben Stokes, Shreyas Iyer trying to show intent, trying to take down a bowler, which I can still agree to, on another day, it wouldn’t have been a catch.”

Stating further, DK said, “Let’s take Yashasvi Jaiswal too, Anderson has been probing him on the fuller length, asking him to drive, in the first innings he got away but then in the second he went with the flow and got caught behind. So they are a team that are capable of putting 300/3 or 500/5 sort of total but they are not doing anything close to that.”

England will start Day 3 of the second Test needing 332 runs to win, while for India, the focus will be on picking 9 wickets to level the series 1-1.