With England leading India by 186 runs with still three wickets in hand in their first innings after the third day’s play in the Manchester Test in the Anderson-Tendulkar Trophy, the talk in cricketing circles has been Indian captain Shubman Gill’s hesitation to bowl off-spinner Washington Sundar. Sundar had taken four wickets for 22 runs in the third Test at Lords and the 25-year-old picked up the wickets of Ollie Pope and Harry Brook after his delayed introduction in England’s first innings.
With Indian team management once again giving cold shoulder to leg-spinner Kuldeep Yadav in the Test series, former Indian spinner Ravichandran Ashwin took a dig at Indian team management decisions saying he is ‘little happy that Kuldeep Yadav did not play’.
“In a way I am a little happy that Kuldeep Yadav did not play and it’s good. Because you had five bowlers including two spinners and Washington Sundar has been brought to bowl in the 68th over. Kuldeep could have bowled after the second new ball. So it could be possible that he could not find the ball. I mean he probably could have got the ball in his hand. So I felt all those things were a little amusing,” Ashwin said on his Youtube channel Ash ki Baat.
On a day when England batsman Joe Root scored his 38th Test hundred with his knock of 150 runs and England building a 186-run first innings lead over India with captain Ben Stokes and Liam Dawson to resume on Saturday, Sundar took two wickets with the old ball. His first wicket came in the 77th over in the form of Ollie Pope followed by the wicket of Harry Brook. Sundar and Ravindra Jadeja would bowl ten overs among themselves with India not choosing the new ball after the 80th over and captain Gill opted for new ball in the 90th over with Mohammad Siraj and Jasprit Bumrah bowling with the new ball. Ashwin opined that Sundar could have bowled with the new ball too on the Manchester wicket. “Because he has two wickets with the old ball. And there was a very good opportunity to bowl with him with the new ball on this wicket. Because the over spin ball was turning. Like Jadeja’s over spin was turning especially the way he got the wicket of Joe Root. One thing, which I really liked about Jadeja was he was bowling from close to the stumps and his arm was coming right from near his ear. So it means it’s coming from really an upright position and you will get over spin. So every ball that has spun over the top, has bounced and has given a bit of turn,” Ashwin added.
With the wicket offering turn, Ashwin also believes that England off-spinner Liam Dawson can play a big role during India’s second innings. The former Indian spinner also praised Dawson, who was batting on 21 after the end of the third day’s play. “I was telling earlier that if England bat long, Liam Dawson could be a real danger man in the third innings of this Test match. His batting also looked so solid. I just feel he has a role to play in this Test match and I wouldn’t be surprised if Dawson extracts much more out of this surface than we did,” Ashwin said.
