Team India’s T20I form has dipped following changes in personnel and leadership, with back-to-back series defeats to Ireland and England. Speaking on JioStar’s Googlies, JioStar experts Parthiv Patel and Abhishek Nayar analysed the key areas India need to address in T20 cricket going forward, Tilak Varma’s form, and how the dressing room environment used to be after tough defeats under Rohit Sharma’s captaincy.
Speaking on JioStar’s ‘Googlies’, JioStar expert Parthiv Patel identified the key areas of concern for Team India following their 2-0 T20I series defeat to Ireland:
“The result was a bit surprising and shocking. You can’t expect to beat Ireland after playing poor cricket. Over the last two to two-and-a-half years, the most alarming aspect of Indian cricket has been fielding, across the men’s team, the women’s team and even junior cricket. Even in the Ireland series, had those two or three catches been taken in the first game, they wouldn’t have scored over 180. The same thing happened in the second game. This is definitely an area India needs to address because they’re dropping catches at crucial moments. Secondly, just as we have T20 specialists in batting, why don’t we look for the same in bowling? We always think, ‘Bumrah will come back and do the job.’ Then we keep going back to the likes of Prasidh Krishna. We also have bowlers like Prince Yadav and Mohsin Khan, so we need to start looking at T20 specialist bowlers as well.”
On hoping to see Tilak Varma back in run-scoring form:
“I’m just hoping we don’t see another vice-captain get dropped. The kind of batting line-up we have can’t work in the long term. If six of your top seven batters are left-handers, that batting order won’t work. Changes have to be made somewhere. Now, who comes into the side and which right-hander gets backed, I don’t know. That’s why Tilak Varma needs to score runs.”
Speaking on JioStar’s ‘Googlies’, JioStar expert Abhishek Nayar reflected on the dressing room environment after tough defeats during his stint as Team India’s assistant coach:
“We had Rohit Sharma as captain, and I remember him coming out after the Mumbai Test and saying in the press conference, ‘It’s okay. We’ve won so many series, we’ve lost this one, and I’ll take responsibility for it.’ That’s who Rohit was. There was always that side of him that could lighten the mood and make sure the team was okay. Of course, whenever India loses, it hurts everyone. But the one thing he did exceptionally well was look after his players. He would think about who had been affected the most, who hadn’t scored runs, and how he could make them feel better. The quality I admired most about Rohit was that he always took responsibility. He would never come out and blame anyone by saying, ‘You did this’ or ‘You did that.’ Instead, he would put his hand up and say, ‘I failed.’ You would never hear him making excuses or throwing someone under the bus.”
On Rohit Sharma’s ability to build trust through communication:
“I remember the Sydney Test when Rohit didn’t play. He still came out, gave the interview, and said exactly what he had to say. He never sugar-coated anything. That’s why the team trusted him. Ask any young cricketer, even today, and they’ll speak very fondly about Rohit Sharma’s captaincy. They’ll tell you that even when he scolded them, they took it seriously because they knew it came from a place of trust and genuine care. As a captain, his communication was exceptional. Sanju Samson spoke about it too after he was left out of the T20 World Cup final in Barbados. Even though Sanju wasn’t playing, Rohit made sure he spoke to him before the toss because he was concerned about how he was feeling. Those difficult phases were a little easier because Rohit Sharma was around.”
Catch ‘Googlies’ ft. Abhishek Nayar and Parthiv Patel, exclusively on JioHotstar and Star Sports YouTube Channel.