Will Kuldeep Yadav get his first game of the series in the final Test of this long tour? The team management is considering that option but it’s not going to be an open-and-shut case.
Unfortunately for Kuldeep, according to those in the know, it isn’t his skill or talent that the decision-makers doubt. What keeps him out of the team is the unreliability of India’s frontline batsmen – namely the No.3 and, surprisingly, also the wicket-keepers. At the start of the tour, it was Rishabh Pant and now it’s his replacement Dhruv Jurel. And also the local conditions. More about how The Oval might not be ideal for Kuldeep later.
First the wicket-keepers. Pant has been an enigma for the cricketing world, and also for the team. When dealing with him, the Indian decision-makers stick to ‘believe in God but lock your car’ philosophy. He has been an asset to the team but not quite a steady stock – before this Anderson-Tendulkar Trophy series.
At one point, there was a school of thought that plans can’t be formed around someone with the habit of leaping down the track in the first over he faces. And certainly not someone who has scored just one fifty in nine innings in Australia, India’s last Test outing before the England tour.
It’s not that those with correct strokes and conventional outlook towards scoring runs don’t have bad patches. They also fail but it’s human to trust a textbook cricketer playing in a time-tested manner. If a mathematician has to describe the Indian batting line-up, KL Rahul and Shubman Gill will be constants and batsmen like Pant the variables.
On this tour, Pant was becoming one of the constants. In his seven innings here, he has two 100s and three 50s. But just when the team management was getting used to the runs coming from down the order, India’s most comfortable-looking batsman on the tour was hit on the foot by a full ball – the fracture ruling him out of the remainder of the series.
In Pant’s place comes Jurel, who has played just one Test outside India. His outing at Perth wasn’t too long.
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Not instilling confidence
The other Virat Kohli-sized hole in the middle order is at the No.3 spot where Sai Sudharsan and Karun Nair haven’t yet given confidence to the team management. They have been given chances but have shown a tendency to get out to innocuous balls and not score in crunch situations. They don’t seem to be putting a high price on their wicket.
In case India had a settled No.3 and a wicket-keeper playing percentage cricket, Kuldeep would have been a sure-shot selection in most Tests in England. That hasn’t happened so India faces the old question again: Should they go with the specialist left-arm wrist-spinner or stick to pace all-rounder Shardul Thakur?
Batting coach Sitanshu Kotak, like many other Team India coaches who have faced the media, explained the complexity of the Kuldeep call. He was asked a pertinent question about playing four specialist bowlers from 8 to 11 – in other words Kuldeep and three pure pacers.
Kotak took his time to say that “scoring 550 to 600 runs is as important as taking 20 wickets” and it was by scoring runs that they won their only Test of this series at Edgbaston.
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“Once you play with five bowlers, everyone has to bowl well. In case you play with six bowlers, one of them can be under-bowled. And if that bowler is an all-rounder, you know he will also contribute in batting. But if he happens to be a pure bowler … when you look back at the game, you will think that instead of an extra bowler, if we had a batsman…” he explained the quandary.
Kotak indicated that it’s always easy to be wise after a game. Before it, the only thing the team management can do is think of playing a balanced side. But he still didn’t rule out Kuldeep. “That also depends on the wicket and what we feel about it .. the captain and coach will take a look at the pitch and decide who they will play.”
Surface tension
Now to the pitch and the question of adding Kuldeep to the spin department that has un-droppable all-rounders Ravindra Jadeja and Washington Sundar. Can India play three spinners at The Oval?
Historically, the venue helps spinners but this time around, the domestic games here have seen teams scoring in the range of 250-300 with pacers doing most of the damage. This is clear from the new addition to the England squad – homeboy Jamie Overton.
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With offie Shoaib Basher injured and Liam Dawson not really effective at Manchester, England will focus on their quicks. Overton joins Gus Atkinson, another Surrey boy, who know his way around The Oval.
Does that mean India will play Jasprit Bumrah? That looks unlikely but can’t be ruled out. If the World No.1 bowler sits out, India in all likelihood will play Mohammed Siraj, Akash Deep and, finally, Arshdeep Singh.
Is it worth burdening Bumrah with extra workload? It was something that coach Gautam Gambhir, at one point on this tour, was dead against. But then India’s only win on this tour came when Bumrah wasn’t in the XI. And has he become less impactful with the new ball and gotten slower as the series has progressed? At The Oval, India need to bring out stone, paper and those sharp scissors.
