India vs England: Vikram Rathour on Shubman Gill, Shreyas Iyer and tough choice between Sarfaraz and Patidar

India’s batting coach Vikram Rathour stressed that the likes of Shubman Gill and Shreyas Iyer deserve patience amid their poor run at the moment. He also urged the batters to tackle England’s aggression with intelligence in the second Test that gets underway on Friday.

India lost the opening Test by 28 runs despite taking a 190 run first innings lead with Ollie Pope scoring 196 runs to turn the game around.

“There are young batters in our team who have not played much Test cricket. So, we need to be a bit patient with them. Batters like (Shubman) Gill, (Yashasvi) Jaiswal and (Shreyas) Iyer will eventually start getting big runs, I’m sure of it,” Rathour said in a press conference on Visakhapatnam on Wednesday.

Read | Changes India could make for second Test

Jaiswal scored 80 runs in the first innings of the first Test in Hyderabad but Gill and Iyer failed to fire. Gill, who has played 21 Tests, hasn’t scored a fifty in his last nine innings. Iyer, who has appeared in 13 Test matches, has been equally off-colour.

“There’s a difference between playing with intent and playing attacking cricket. I want them to play with intent. If there is the opportunity to score some runs, they should take it,” Rathour said.

“They need to decide by looking at the surface and conditions. So, the batters need to possess that intelligence as to which is the best or safest shot on the surface,” he explained.

Lack of discipline

Rathour felt India’s batting performance in the second innings probably lacked discipline. “Could they have batted with more discipline? Maybe they could have. That’s what they need to decide and come up with their plans,” he observed.

“But, they need to score runs by playing their shots, as you need to back your strengths. Batting is always about scoring runs. It’s not about not getting out but how many runs you put on the board,” he said.

Read | Shubman Gill must make technical adjustments amid poor run

India’s trio of spinners – R Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja and Axar Patel – were left ineffective as England used the sweep shot well to blunt their impact. Rathour said it’s not a stroke that can be added overnight to a player’s repertoire. “…you need to be prepared for that by practising it. If you add more shots to your game, it’s always beneficial. We played traditionally. The strength of strong areas is going straight when it comes to using our feet.

“We can keep doing that, and of course, if we can add more shots and score through the square of the wicket, that’s always an addition,” he said.

Rathour praised the English batters for playing brave cricket, especially Pope, effectively taking the game away from India. However, he maintained that England’s strong showing has not put his team under any additional pressure. “They (England) were brave. They took their chances, which worked for them. The kind of innings Pope played was exceptional. I haven’t seen too many playing such a knock against our bowling attack,” he said.

“I don’t think (there’s any pressure). We are expected to win while playing in India, and the boys are used to that by now.

“The message to them from the support staff is to play good cricket and not bother about results too much. The other teams also come well-prepared. Since we have won Test matches in Australia, England and South Africa, we also expect them to win a Test in India.”

On Sarfaraz vs Patidar

With Virat Kohli, KL Rahul and Ravindra Jadeja all missing the second Test, one of Sarfaraz Khan and Rajat Patidar could come into the playing XI.

“It will be a tough choice. What value they bring to the team, of course, is that they are superb players. We have seen how well they have done in domestic cricket in the last few years,” Rathour said of the reinforcements.

Read | Sarfaraz Khan vs Rajat Patidar: Tough choice for India

“So on these kind of wickets, I think they can really add a lot of value to the team.”

He added, “If we have to pick just one out of them, of course, it would be tough. But, that decision will be made by Rahul Dravid (coach) and Rohit Sharma (captain).”

The playing XI will be finalised keeping in mind the conditions. “It (pitch) is difficult to predict. It will turn, maybe not from the first day, but eventually, it will turn. That’s how the wicket looks like.”

‘No question of recovery’

Rathour believes more than recovery, the players need to learn and move on. “There’s no question of recovery. You keep learning every game that you play. Of course, we could have done better in batting, bowling and fielding. A lot of discussions and ideas are being shared, preparing well and hoping to do well in the next game.”

He expressed confidence in the players’ ability to bounce back and cited India’s unbeaten record in Test series at home since 2012. “We keep talking about our batters (not scoring enough), but India has been winning a lot of series at home. We haven’t lost a series at home for 12-13 years. “It means we are putting up more runs than the other teams. These are tough conditions to score runs, but I’m sure that the batters will find a way.”

(with inputs from PTI)