Kohli’s captaincy improving with each series
India will be satisfied with the result of the series against South Africa. They did very well to come back after the losses in the one-dayers and T20s. The Tests ended up being very one-sided and it came as a massive surprise to the cricketloving public.
Very rarely would one have seen a South African team perform like this in Test cricket and they were really found wanting against the turning ball. One must also accept the fact that batting was tough in these conditions and it’s rare to see just two hundreds being scored overall in a Test series.
The South Africans looked completely out of sorts against the turning ball. What stood out most was their shot selection. It is acceptable that it wasn’t easy but the application was also missing and more often than not, the batting was trying to hit their way into form. That was always going to be tough in these conditions. One has to play the shots but it has to be percentage cricket where the risk factor is minimised.
Incidentally, defence is an important asset against the turning ball but none of the South Africans had enough confidence to do that for long periods. This should be a huge learning experience for the players and they must be thankful to the bowling unit as they had managed to keep the team in the game in every match.
Tested gameplan
For India, it was nothing new. The art of bamboozling overseas batsmen continued on the helpful surfaces. Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravinder Jadeja continued their good run with the ball but their lower order contributions with the bat also played a key role in the team’s victories. However, overall the Indian batting also struggled to get going. There were no hundreds except from Ajinkya Rahane and he must be breathing a sigh of relief after opening his account in India. He is a class act and will continue to be a pillar of the Indian batting.
What stood out for me was the continuous improvement of Virat Kohli, the captain. He was very good in Sri Lanka and showed his hunger for success here as well. One can argue that these pitches were tailor-made for Indian bowling but, as captain, one still has to set the right fields and he did not make too many mistakes in that department.
His hunger for victory is infectious and in spite of having already won the series, I liked his go-for-victory approach on fifth day of the Delhi Test. To keep a team interested in going for a win is very crucial and he did manage to do that. His captaincy is improving every series and it’s a delight to watch, just like his batting.