Rohit’s bold leadership tested on one of India’s worst Test days

It’s not often that an Indian captain walks into the press conference room in the middle of a Test match. Sourav Ganguly did it back in Bulawayo in September 2005, but that was after he scored a hundred against Zimbabwe and perhaps mainly because he was aware that questions regarding the friction between him and then-coach Greg Chappell would allow him to present his side of the story.
Rohit Sharma doesn’t enjoy either pre- or post-match press dos, so for him to volunteer to front the media after one of India’s worst Test days ever might be viewed as a selfless act. Minutes after New Zealand had finished day two of the first Test in Bengaluru in supreme control after bowling India out for 46, their lowest score at home and third lowest of all time, and powering away to 180 for three, India’s captain put his hand up, conceding that he had misjudged the playing surface at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium.
“We expected the pitch to be a little flatter than what it turned out to be,” he went on. “Sometimes you make the right call, sometimes you don’t. I was on the other (wrong) side of it this time around. I am hurting a little bit, because I made that call.” No hiding behind ‘collective decision,’ no sharing the blame around. “We didn’t play well. Simple.”
Full marks to the skipper for honesty and for accepting responsibility. But could this whole exercise have been avoided?
Most certainly. With a little more commonsense, or even with a more disciplined and intelligent batting display.
A million eyebrows were raised when India chose to bat on the second morning – the entire first day had been washed out. Logic seemed to dictate that with the surface having spent pretty much the whole of the last three days under wraps, there would be assistance, and plenty of it, for the quicker bowlers. If any set of conditions demanded bowling first, it was these.
But wait. Tom Latham, the New Zealand captain, said he too would have batted first if he had the choice. “It was thus a good toss to lose,” grinned Matt Henry like a Cheshire cat, relishing a fourth five-for that took the Kiwi pacer to 100 Test wickets.
Thing is, between the toss and the start of play at 9.15 am, the clouds gathered overhead, enveloping the sun in their cold embrace. But whether that alone changed the entire dynamics of batting is debatable.
Rohit pointed to the absence of any grass on the pitch, saying the challenge, if any, would be the first two sessions, after which the track would get very good for batting. Sound in theory, but in practice, India were bowled out in less than three hours and 31.2 overs. Through a combination of New Zealand industry and enterprise, and their own diffidence and iffy shot-selection that brought about many a downfall.
Rohit and Gautam Gambhir would clearly have factored in Shubman Gill’s absence. In his last six Tests, the new No. 3 has three centuries and therefore his absence with a stiff neck was a big blow. Who would occupy the No. 3 slot? Sarfaraz Khan, his replacement? KL Rahul, the long-time opener now finding his calling at No. 6? Or Virat Kohli, the former skipper who had batted in that position six times previously, with a highest of 41?
Kohli was quick to accept the new challenge, but with no success. He was out without scoring to a lifter from William O’Rourke, as was Sarfaraz, playing an aggressive stroke way too early in his innings and being sensationally caught right-handed at mid-off by Devon Conway. Rahul chimed in with a third duck, snaffled down leg by ‘keeper Tom Blundell as his tendency to play with a closed upper body proved decisively disastrous.
Only Yashasvi Jaiswal and Rishabh Pant, among the more aggressive of an ultra-attacking line-up, showed application and grim determination. The rest came and went in a sorry and ungainly procession. It was the second time this year – after Cape Town in January — that five or more Indians were dismissed without scoring in a Test innings; it was also the first time since Mohali in 1999, also against New Zealand, that there were five ducks in a completed Indian innings on home soil. Truly damning numbers, even if they can sometimes be wished away as just one bad day in office.
India have done a million things right in the last several years in Test cricket. The juxtaposition of a massive error in judgement and a terrible batting collapse on the same day certainly don’t fall in that category.