Dravid praises his young guns

Dharamsala – India coach Rahul Dravid on Saturday lauded his team’s rising young talent for confidently filling the gap left by senior players after their 4-1 win in a high-profile England series.

Rohit Sharma’s men lost the opener but bounced back to clinch the five-match series in the fourth match and then hammered England by an innings and 64 runs in the final Test inside three days in Dharamsala.

“I think just the fact that we lost the first Test match, had to bounce back from there, had to do it with a slightly different team to the one that we probably expected to start the series with a few months ago,” Dravid told reporters.

“It does make you feel really proud and happy for the way the team’s evolved, the team’s grown and just happy for the boys.”

India were missing several top stars including Virat Kohli, who was out due to the birth of his second child, and KL Rahul, who was injured, but new talent delivered in their place.

Opener Yashasvi Jaiswal, 22, led the batting total for both sides with 712 runs – including double centuries in matches two and three – to be named Man-of-the-Series.

Batsmen Sarfaraz Khan and Devdutt Padikkal, wicketkeeper Dhruv Jurel and fast bowler Akash Deep also made impressive debuts.

“I think it’s just nice to see the confidence of the young India in some ways,” said Dravid.

“Just the amount of exposure these young boys have, by the time they’re 22-23, the amount of cricket they’ve played, certainly does help,” he added.

“They are a lot more confident, they have a lot more belief in their abilities. It’s just about trying to keep things quite relaxed.

I do believe that it’s very hard to get into an Indian team. You have to really earn it, there’s a lot of competition.”

India lost the opener by 28 runs but came back with big wins including a 434-run thrashing of the tourists in the third Test.

England had their moments in the first four matches only to lose the advantage to an Indian side unbeaten in a Test series at home since 2012, when England beat the hosts 2-1. –