India lost the first match at Edgbaston. (Source: Reuters) India lost the first match at Edgbaston. (Source: Reuters) “They (England) were relentless and they made us work very hard for our runs,” said India captain Virat Kohli during the post-match presentation at Edgbaston. India had failed to chase a target of 194. Well, Kohli might have the perception that England bowlers made his batsmen work hard in getting runs but if spectators and pundits are to be believed, it was the lack of temperament that made the visitors lose the first Test. The teams have now moved to Lord’s for the second Test and the Indian captain Kohli in the pre-match press conference has hinted that India might field two spinners looking at the conditions so far. Two spinners in playing XI means Kohli will have to make one of his quick bowlers sit in the dugout. Looking at the recent performances, Umesh Yadav should be the one to miss the bus. Ishant had been in great touch and has picked wickets on this tour while Mohammed Shami who missed the limited overs fixtures after failing the Yo-yo test has also been impressive. The bowling department though doesn’t really need a lot of changes as the only spinner in the Edgbaston game, R Ashwin too impressed with his bowling. The Indian team needs to tweak the batting order and needs to show exit gate to Shikhar Dhawan from the playing XI who has not only been out of touch with the bat but has been dropping catches in the slip too. He put down as many as three catches in two innings in the last match and only scored 26 and 13. Moreover, he didn’t have a great time at the crease in the only warm-up match that India played against Essex where the left-hander scored 0 and 0 in two innings. India made a surprise call in Edgbaston Test when they asked Cheteshwar Pujara to warm the bench. Cheteshwar Pujara was not included in the team for the first Test. (Source: Reuters) Cheteshwar Pujara was not included in the team for the first Test. (Source: Reuters) Pujara’s exclusion from the XI in the last match produced a result that didn’t go in India’s favour. He could have been that one batsman whom Kohli was scouting for to stay with him at the crease for a long time. Pujara might get his first game of the tour when India lock horns with England at Lord’s from Thursday. Murali Vijay can have KL Rahul as his opening partner followed by Pujara at three and captain at four. The Indian team management would also want Ajinkya Rahane to get his form back. He has a hundred at Lord’s and the visiting team would expect him to repeat the feat. England on the other side will be making at least two changes in their playing XI as all-rounder Ben Stokes won’t be available for this match because of the court proceedings this week on a criminal charge of affray. Stokes played an important role in England’s win against India in the first match after he scalped an important wicket of Kohli in the second innings. While Stokes is out of this game, Dawid Malan too has been dropped and has been replaced by youngster Ollie Pope. The hosts though will bank upon their new find Sam Curran who bagged a four-for in the first innings of the first match and also chipped in with a quick half-century to help his side set India a target of 194. Teams: England: Alastair Cook, Keaton Jennings, Joe Root(c), Ollie Pope, Jonny Bairstow(w), Jos Buttler, Chris Woakes, Sam Curran, Adil Rashid, Stuart Broad, James Anderson, Moeen Ali India: Murali Vijay, Shikhar Dhawan, Lokesh Rahul, Virat Kohli(c), Ajinkya Rahane, Dinesh Karthik(w), Hardik Pandya, Ravichandran Ashwin, Mohammed Shami, Ishant Sharma, Umesh Yadav, Kuldeep Yadav, Rishabh Pant, Ravindra Jadeja, Cheteshwar Pujara, Karun Nair, Shardul Thakur<doc-sep>India lost the first Test by 31 runs. (Source: AP) India lost the first Test by 31 runs. (Source: AP) For the last two days here, dark clouds have swirled over the heads. It pelted down on Tuesday night, though clear skies broke out on Wednesday. The 22 yards still seemed dry, with grass on the surface to hold it together. Both teams haven’t announced their final eleven, humming and hawing about the possibility of two spinners. But that can wait. The bigger picture is simple: India need to win here, else they stand the risk of getting buried in the series. What interests one is how the batsmen hold up. India were denied a win in Edgbaston by their own hands. “Get on to that front foot. In England, you make a living off your front foot.” No one said that explicitly but it used to be the philosophy of most Indian batsmen from earlier generations when it came to batting in this land. Rahul Dravid, Sachin Tendulkar and Sourav Ganguly. Even the current batting coach Sanjay Bangar, for that matter, in that famous Headingly Test. If there is one thing that has been missing in the current lot, it’s that forward stride. Over the two days, with the opportunity to stand really close where you can almost touch the net strings, the absence of the front foot stride hit you more than ever. Barring that man Virat Kohli, of course. A short forward press later, he decides where his foot should roam, according to the needs of the ball. READ | Years back, his pal took a wager… Alastair Cook would score 10,000 runs Not so with the others. The likes of KL Rahul, Ajinkya Rahane, Cheteshwar Pujara, Shikhar Dhawan and even Murali Vijay – who in the past has shown a preference to get forward – like to stick around on the crease. Not that they are stuck; in fact, if anything, it’s a treadmill kind of movement. They go forward, but hustle back at release even to length deliveries. It was all quite fascinating. Why would you do that? What’s the thought behind it? Almost as if their head was telling them to get forward but something was holding them back. Rahul’s technique, in particular, is quite interesting. Forget the foot, it’s his hands that you notice. Not many batsmen pick up the bat the way he does. In his stance, his hands are held behind the body. Even Kohli starts off like that but he pushes it forward just before release, just as he takes that forward press. Rahul’s hands remain behind. No wonder he tends to reach out to full deliveries outside off a touch awkwardly. His upper body is leaning forward but hands that drive the bat trail behind and when the ball is slightly away and full, his hands just go at it. Since it’s a fraction behind, it’s going to come that much late, and often, he ends up jabbing the drive, away from the body. Vijay was very intense on Tuesday. Much would come down to him if India are to pull off something special here. He has looked in good nick and his general demeanour suggests he is desperate for a big score. He is one of the batsmen who likes getting on that front foot. He is at his best when he can lean forward. Coming in, or going straight? His troubles start when he isn’t sure whether the ball is coming in or holding its line. He isn’t someone who is unsure of his off- stump. But if he is unable to read the ball, he can invariably push out or like he did at Edgsbaston, shoulder arms purely based on the line of the ball. In hindsight, it seems the South African tour where he had problems picking the action of bowlers like Vernon philander has made him a bit tentative. That shouldering-arms-dismissal to Stuart Broad, whose stock ball cuts into right-handed batsmen, should nag him. He is better than that. India would hope he reels off a big score here: he has the talent, temperament and, it seems, a fierce desire. Of course, every batsmen has his own technique but this one step forward, one step back routine (in England) of Indian batsmen did prick the mind. And so you ask Kohli. And his answer was wise. That every batsman has his own plans and these guys have been trying their best at the nets. “As a batsman, it is very difficult for me to point it out. Individuals react differently to different things, variable reasons as to why a particular player is doing a certain thing on the field. How I prepare will be very different from another player,” he said. He further observed that he can’t gauge what’s going through a batsman’s head when he walks out to the middle. “You can’t pinpoint exactly what the mindset is when a player goes out to bat … It is about going out and being positive about every situation you are in and not about thinking what is going to happen. It is just about seeing the ball and reacting according to the ball,” he said. Lessons from the past He then dipped into his own past to point out the mental errors that had held him back. “Sometimes as a batsman, I have faltered in the past when I have thought maybe I will get a good ball somewhere and look to tide over at that particular time. That is something that has pulled me back. Now I am in a zone where I have to respect a good ball, back my ability and play for as long as I can.” “ You are definitely going to get out, you just delay that. It is not that you can’t get out in cricket. You just have to try and delay that eventuality which as batsmen, we all try to achieve,” he explained. It’s nice of him to say that, but you don’t get that feeling when you watch him bat.<doc-sep>James Anderson (5/20) and Chris Woakes (2/19) starred with the ball as England bowled India out for a meagre 107 in 35.2 overs on Day 2 of the second Test at Lord's. In a rain interrupted day, India batsmen failed to counter the swing of Anderson and Woakes and fell like ninepins. At the start of the day, Anderson put his team on top with two quick wickets of Murali Vijay (0) and KL Rahul (8) before rain came calling. India's woes continued as Cheteshwar Pujara, who is making a comeback in the second Test, was run-out for one after a mix-up with captain Virat Kohli just before tea. With the pitch being under covers for most of the day due to incessant rain, threat loomed large over another day being washed out again. However, the weather cleared and the players made their way back in the middle and India resumed their innings on 15/3 after a tea and rain break. Following the break, Chris Woakes dismissed captain Kohli for 23 and Hardik Pandya for 11 to put India further on the back foot. It seemed India would be all out for less than 100 runs but Ravichandran Ashwin scored a quickfire 29 to help India cross the 100-run mark. After Ashwin's dismissal, Mohammed Shami added 10 more runs to India's total, courtesy two boundaries off Stuart Broad. (SCORECARD) Play fantasy league and win cash daily Highlights of India vs England, 2nd Test, Day 2, straight from Lord's 23:50 IST: Day 2 stumps -- India 107 all out in 35.2 overs. (Kohli 23, Ashwin 29; Anderson 5/20, Woakes 2/19) England tear through India! The visitors are all out for 107, the hosts' fantastic bowling effort led by @jimmy9's 5/20#ENGvIND scorecard https://t.co/e1I98c7CZY pic.twitter.com/1Nob5ahqlw — ICC (@ICC) August 10, 2018 23:49 IST: OUT! James Anderson traps Ishant Sharma in front of the wicket for a duck to complete a five-wicket haul. 23:46 IST: Four!! Shami is taking on Broad now. back-to-back boundaries for the India pacer now. Same delivery, same shot and same result. 23:45 IST: 100 comes up for India!! Shami swings and swings hard as he edges the ball over the slips for a boundary. 23:43 IST: Ishant Sharma and Mohammed Shami out in the middle as India need three more runs to reach the 100-run mark. 23:40 IST: OUT! This is Stuart Broad gets in the action as Ashwin departs for 29. Broad angles the ball into the right-hander, Ashwin looking to work the ball around, misses and gets rapped on the pads. 23:36 IST: OUT! Anderson gets his fourth as Kuldeep is caught plumb for a duck. A loud appeal from Anderson convinces the on-field umpire as he raises his finger. Kuldeep opts for a review but video reviews tells the same story. Kuldeep walks back for a duck. 23:34 IST: India 95/7 in 33 overs. (Ashwin 28*, Kuldeep 0*) 23:30 IST: Four! Aswhin spots the short delivery from Broad early as he gets into position and pulls the ball with authority. The ball races away to the boundary. Broad is left unimpressed. 23:29 IST: FOUR!! Ashwin welcomes back Broad in the middle with a boundary. Ashwin rocks back and carves the short of a length delivery through the cover. 23:25 IST: Kuldeep Yadav has faced six balls till now and he has been solid in defence. 23:20 IST: India's scores at the fall of seventh wicket in England/South Africa in 2018: 92, 82, 280, 87, 144, 203, 169, 141, 84 (this innings). 23:17 IST: OUT! Yes, Anderson has commenced his destruction. The English pacer pitches the ball around off, Rahane looking to defend, ends up edging the ball straight to Cook. Ajinkya Rahane departs for 18, India 84/7. 23:15 IST: Time for James Anderson again! Can he rattle the lower-order batsmen? 23:12 IST: Four! Short of length delivery with a bit of width, Ashwin rocks back and carves the ball for a boundary. That was beautiful. 23:07 IST: Woakes bowls short of a length delivery, Ashwin trying the work the ball around, edges it high up in the air. Adil Rashid, at mid-on, had no idea where the ball was as Ashwin survives. Comedy scenes here. While Woakes is unhappy, Joe root has a smile on his face. 22:59 IST: Four! Woakes pitches the ball outside off, Ashwin goes for the lofted drive, connects and gets a boundary. 22:55 IST: Four! A welcome sight for the Indian team. Curran strays down the leg-side and Rahane guides the ball down to the fine leg for a boundary. 22:53 IST: OUT! Dinesh Karthik looks absolutely clueless as he walks back to the pavilion. Sam Curran's ball swings into the right-hander and goes through the bat and pad gap to send the wicket cartwheeling. England are on top now. 22:50 IST: Hardik Pandya stats -- 1st innings outside Asia: 93 off 95 balls Next eight innings: 90 off 201 balls. 22:47 IST: India 62/5 in 24 overs. Chris Woakes 2/10 in four overs. 22:46 IST: OUT!! Hardik Pandya's short stay in the middle comes to an end. Chris Woakes strikes again. The Englishman bowls a good length delivery that shapes away and takes the outside edge of a struggling Hardik Pandya. Buttler makes no mistakes as takes a comfortable catch. 22:36 IST: OUT!! This was inevitable. Woakes bowls a fuller delivery, Kohli looking to defend, edges it as the ball flies towards Buttler at a comfortable height. Buttler, at second slips, does not make a mistake. India 49/3 after 21.4 overs as Kohli takes the long walk back for 23. 22:35 IST: That one was close! Virat Kohli, on 23, gets a life. Woakes' late movement creates doubt in Kohli's mind as he is late in leaving the delivery. The ball brushes the face of Kohli's bat and goes wide of Buttler at the slips. The Indian skipper also gets a boundary. Woakes cannot believe his fate! 22:33 IST: Kohli and Rahane have strung together a 29-run partnership till now. 22:30 IST: Sam Curran introduced in the bowling attack. 22:28 IST: Beaten!! This is turning out to be a good over for England.<doc-sep>Virat Kohli’s captaincy has come for some flak from the pundits but the skipper defended himself saying that he is doing his best. (Source: AP) Virat Kohli’s captaincy has come for some flak from the pundits but the skipper defended himself saying that he is doing his best. (Source: AP) Captain Virat Kohli on Wednesday urged followers of Indian cricket to not be judgemental about his team’s poor batting performance after just one Test as the problem is more about making “mental adjustments” rather than technical. India lost the first Test against England by 31 runs with only skipper Kohli crossing the 50 run mark in both innings. “We should not judge so fast, and jump to conclusions As a team, we keep patience. We don’t judge so fast. We don’t see any pattern to (the failures). As far as wickets falling in heap is concerned, it is not about technique, it is more of a mental aspect,” Kohli said at the pre-match press conference. “There must be a clear plan on how to face the first 20-30 balls, and more often than not that plan does not involve aggression. There we need some composure rather than aggression. As a batting unit, we have discussed that,” the skipper said. Kohli said from a team’s perspective they don’t analyse how bad a defeat can look as their focus in on cutting down on margin of error in the next game. “From outside, it looks very bad, especially as it is Test cricket and we are playing in England, where it is anyway difficult. But we only need to bring down the margin of error and beyond that we don’t need to worry too much.” His captaincy has come for some flak from the pundits but the skipper defended himself saying that he is doing his best. “I am doing as much as I can as the captain and there is constant feedback from the management. People have their own ways of looking at the game and their own ideas when it comes to captaincy and so on, but I feel I have had really good communication with all the players.” Kohli did drop a hint that a second specialist spinner in either Ravindra Jadeja or Kuldeep Yadav could be an option as the surface looks dry. “(It) could be a tempting thought. Just walking here the pitch looked very hard and the surface looked very dry. It has been very hot in London for the last couple of months. There is good grass cover on it and that is required basically to keep the wicket together, otherwise it is going to be very difficult to hold it together,” Kohli explained. “It is a tempting thought to field two spinners but we have to take a call on that depending on the team balance. But two spinners are definitely in contention,” he said. When asked if it hurt more that India lost after his lion-hearted effort (149 and 51), Kohli begged to differ. “It doesn’t only hurt when you score runs and you don’t win but it also hurts when you are not scoring runs as well and the team is not doing well. It is not like I feel bad that I got runs and we couldn’t get across the line. It is purely because we haven’t won the games. If I hadn’t got the runs and we had won, I would have got a totally different feeling. It is a very natural aspect of playing team sport.” But world’s premier Test batsman cautioned that every time it won’t be possible for him to score but it doesn’t matter till someone else takes the team over the line. But there isn’t a pattern that India lose outside the sub continent despite his hundreds (it happened in Australia, South Africa and now in England). “I am trying my level best to do that whenever possible. It is not going to happen every time but when it does I want to try and contribute as much as possible. It is unfortunate we haven’t been able to cross the line after coming so close, and that is the only thing we are looking to how we cross the line. I don’t see any pattern in this.” “It doesn’t matter whether I get the runs or Jinks (Ajinkya Rahane) does or (Murali) Vijay does or KL (Rahul) does or whoever does. As long as we cross the line, that is the only thing that matters,” Kohli said. Kohli however didn’t give a clear cut reply whether it was his technique of a pronounced front-foot movement against the likes of James Anderson that stood out unlike others. “It is very difficult for me to point it out. Individuals react differently to different things, and there are variable reasons as to why a particular player is doing a certain thing on the field. That goes into the preparation bit as well. How I prepare will be very different from another player and so on, every other player in the team (prepares differently). You can’t pinpoint exactly what the mindset is when a player goes out to bat.”<doc-sep>
Is time running out for Shikhar Dhawan in whites? Will India play an extra batsman? Should they play two spinners? What exactly is Hardik Pandya's role in the team? Is Dinesh Karthik on borrowed time with dynamic Rishabh Pant around? These are the questions Virat Kohli will have to deal with ahead of India's second Test against England at Lord's. The 31-run defeat margin might tell a different story but the visiting side were nowhere near their best in the first Test at Edgbaston. The Indian batsmen, except for Kohli of course, looked flimsy against the swinging ball, while the bowlers arguably did a decent job to keep their team in the hunt. Having already lost the opening encounter, Kohli will now expect a better performance from his men to make a comeback in the five-match series. Kohli continued with his trend of not fielding the same playing XI in any of the 36 Tests he has been India’s captain, and it will come as a huge surprise if the skipper ends the ongoing streak in London. There is no doubt that India will be all charged up when they step out at the 'Home of Cricket', but before that happens, Kohli and the team management will have to find answers to these following questions: How about two spinners at Lord's? File image of Ravindra Jadeja in action in a Test. (AP Images) Pundits have been urging Kohli to play two tweakers in the second encounter ever since the conclusion of the opening Test. With the temperature hovering around the mid-thirties in London, it's pretty much expected that the surface will begin to wear and tear as the match progresses. And with R Ashwin, who picked up seven wickets in the first game, troubling almost every English batsmen, there's a temptation around the Indian camp to play either Kuldeep Yadav or Ravindra Jadeja to provide more support to the senior off-spinner. "Lord's is a ground with a magnificent pitch, but with the way the weather has been, it is so difficult to keep the moisture not only in the pitch but actually in the square," said England's limited-overs captain Eoin Morgan, who also leads the local county side Middlesex. "I think you will have to consider two spinners. Everybody was surprised that both sides didn't go in with two spinners in the last game which probably took India away what naturally comes to them." If India does opt to deploy a second spinner, Kohli will be more enticed to include Kuldeep than Jadeja. The left-arm wrist spinner had been in tremendous form in the limited-overs format. He picked up 14 wickets in the five white-ball matches (2 T20Is and 3 ODIs) last month and made most of the English batsmen look rather clueless. The 23-year-old can bring freshness to the bowling line-up and will raise a few doubts in the mind of the opposition batsmen. He will be able to generate more spin than Jadeja and can cause enough threat with his leg breaks, googlies, and flippers. However, the advantage Jadeja has over his young teammate is his experience. The all-rounder is also pretty decent with the bat and can give India those crucial 30-40 runs from No. 8 or 9. What about Dhawan, the Test batsman? (AP Photo) Over the last four years, the opener has never played a full overseas Test series. Dhawan's ODI record outside Asia is quite good, but when it comes to the red-ball format, his stats are rather mediocre. During India's tour to South Africa earlier in the year, Dhawan featured in only two Tests (out of three) where he could only manage 32 runs. In the first Test at Edgbaston, the left-hander scored just 26 and 13 in the first and second innings respectively and was highly criticised for his approach in the longest format of the game. He was undone by out swingers which could have been avoided or defended, but instead, Dhawan went for the flashy drive in both the innings which led to his downfall. Expressing his unhappiness over Dhawan's approach Sunil Gavaskar said: "Shikhar simply does not want to change his game. He believes in playing in the same manner which has brought him success until now. You can still get away with such shots in one-day cricket because there aren't many slips and the push or the edge goes for a boundary through the slip cordon.