Batting great Sunil Gavaskar has criticised England’s new approach in Test cricket – Bazball and said they can only taste success with that against an inferior bowling attack. England are currently 0-2 down in the ongoing Ashes Test series after the first two-match. They have played an attacking brand of cricket with the bat but failed to produce the results which has put them under the scanner.
Ben Stokes has led the side from the front and played a couple of sensational knocks but failed to get the team over the line.
Gavaskar suggested that against a top-class Aussie bowling attack, England need to play the classic Test cricket and not the T20 type of shots.
“As for Bazball, forget it. It happened against lesser-quality bowling, but against a top-class Australian attack it’s back to good old grinding batting and not T20 shots. Test cricket is, after all, Test cricket,” Gavaskar wrote ‘Mid-day’.
Gavaskar also hailed the Australian bowlers for getting their plans right against England’s ultra-attacking batting approach.
“While the Australian attack was certainly taken by surprise at the approach of the England batters in the first Test match, they quickly regathered themselves and realized that this Bazball approach couldn’t succeed against their attack consistently,” he added.
Gavaskar further said that Australia identified early about the England batters’ struggle against short balls and attacked them with balls around ribcages and helmets to stun them.
“They also learned that bowling short to the English batters was going to get them wickets rather than the pitched-up deliveries which the batters were prepared for. Suddenly, with having to play the ball around their ribcage and helmets, the English batsmen found they couldn’t quite cope with it and so Australia went two up without too much trouble,” he added.
Meanwhile, England have a chance to bounce back in the series on Friday but they were left looking to inspirational captain Ben Stokes for yet more Headingley heroics after losing Joe Root in a tense finish to the third Ashes Test on Sunday.
In a match they had to win to keep their Ashes hopes alive at 2-0 down with three to play, England were 153-4 at lunch on the fourth day — still needing a further 98 runs to reach a victory target of 251.
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