Follow UsThe senior Indian men’s cricket team and their selection process during the five-match Test series in England starting today, June 20, will be going through the dilemma between the conventional route and the funky, gutsy one.
If you scratch the surface of this dilemma, it's essentially a choice between the comfort of knowing and the uncertainties (and thrill) of not knowing. That’s why counterintuitive decision-making requires a lot of belief, and once made, it also reflects what kind of personality or character you possess as a person or team.
There would be multiple combinations in hand, and as the new skipper Shubman Gill pointed out, decisions would be made based on the pitch, and the team will push hard to get 20 wickets to win the match.
20 wickets — that’s where the main problem lies for India. And if you keep aside the inexperienced and new look batting order for some time, you’ll realise that the team are in a slippery hole when it comes to figuring out the bowling combination that can dismiss the opposition twice.
Jasprit Bumrah has been phenomenal in the last World Test Championship for India, taking 77 wickets in 28 innings at just 15.1 runs apiece. So ahead is he on this list that the second-best Indian pacer, Mohammed Siraj, has taken 29 fewer wickets despite playing four more innings, and has given 14 more runs/wicket than Bumrah in this period. Not only that, Bumrah even bowled more overs than Siraj, despite him being in a slightly iffy situation with his back, and hence his workload this entire cycle.
However, what’s really troubling is the record of the third and fourth pacers on this list, Akash Deep and Prasidh Krishna. While the latter has played only three Tests and got eight wickets at 29.6 runs apiece, Akash Deep has averaged 35.2 with the ball in the last WTC cycle.
Yes, they played in Australia and it was the first such occasion for the two; however, this reflects the worrisome fact that India are not spoilt for choices when it comes to picking 20 wickets in a Test match in England as far as their pace bowling is concerned.
Bumrah and the team have also decided that India’s ace pacer won’t be playing more than three Tests to avoid the Sydney-like situation, which accentuated into the pacer missing the Champions Trophy.
In such a situation, India need someone who can not only bowl a lot of overs and hold fort while the swashbuckling English batters try and dominate, but also strike at regular intervals and remind the opposition of their vulnerabilities.
Left-arm wrist spinner Kuldeep Yadav can actually be a one-stop solution to all these troubles.
Emerging out of R. Ashwin’s shadows wouldn't be easy for Kuldeep, who has played most of his Test career so far as the third spinner who comes after the cushion of Ashwin-Ravindra Jadeja spin combo. However, in the 10 opportunities he got to bowl in the last WTC cycle, he picked 22 wickets at just 23.1, which is better than even Jadeja or Ashwin. In fact, he picked his wickets at a much quicker rate than both the spin stalwarts.
Moreover, what’s even more revealing about Kuldeep’s striking ability in Test cricket is the fact that his career strike rate (37.4) after 13 Tests is the best amongst all spinners in Test history with a cutoff of 50 Test wickets!
On top of this, when you bring into the picture his exploits against England in Test cricket, where the English batters are being dismissed by him at an average of just 22.3, you understand the incisiveness Kuldeep is capable of on the field.
Just numbers are enough to tell you that much. One is not even going into the details of how the English batters, except Joe Root (who averages 35.5 against left-arm wrist spin), have failed to decipher him and his variations. In fact, Stokes averages in the low 20s against the spinner from Kanpur.
The English team, meanwhile, are looking to have good batting conditions in the series as a buffer for their current playing style. Once coupled with the fall off in performance of fast bowlers who bowl after Bumrah, it becomes imperative that India come up with a strategy to counter them if they wish to dismiss England twice in a span of a Test match.
That’s where Kuldeep jumps into the picture as a genuine wicket-taker and a conditions-agnostic bowler. Wrist-spinners don’t always need the help of a turning wicket to pick their wickets, and Kuldeep, especially, is adept at drifting the ball and then just moving the ball deceptively away or into the batters.
If the conditions replicate the classic English weather with clouds overhead, Kuldeep can get the ball to move in the air adeptly just because of how much more vigour and rotations he has been able to impart on his deliveries lately.
In such a situation, Kuldeep can also be played as the specialist spinner along with a three-man pace attack. While India’s batting might get stretched thin, they’ll have the option of playing six proper batters along with Jadeja at seven in such a combination.
Meanwhile, in games where Bumrah won’t be playing, India would be seriously missing the presence of a bowler who can come after the initial bursts. That's where Gill can employ Kuldeep to increase the risk involved in shot-making, as chances of the ball being miscued will rise rapidly when the English batters might start getting complacent or Bazball-ish, .
India didn’t choose to play Ashwin as their lead spinner in England most of the time, as they had a solid four-man or three-man pace attack who could maintain the intensity of the bowling without a steep fall off between the first and the third/fourth pacer.
However, the situation is not the same this time. It demands a pragmatic selection approach, which throws the coach's playbook of how to pick a team in England out of the window and makes decisions based on the strengths and weaknesses of this current team.
Data, context, and logic all seem to suggest that India should go counterintuitive and take the road less travelled when it comes to playing Kuldeep in all five games of this series.
Regardless, it would be interesting to see which road Gautam Gambhir and Gill eventually take, because apart from the results, it will also tell about the character and steel of this team. Bring it on!