Aakash Chopra fires India a stark warning, claims the batters’ problems against spin set to worsen

Former Indian opener Aakash Chopra has tried dissecting why Indian batters struggled against spin in the recent ODI series loss against Sri Lanka. Sri Lanka won the series 2-0 after the first ODI ended in a tie.

For Sri Lanka, it was an ODI series win against India after 27 years. India lost 27 wickets against spin in the series, the most by any team in a three-match bilateral series. Jeffrey Vandersay picked up 8 wickets in the series, six in the second ODI to rattle the Indian batting lineup.

In the first two games, openers Rohit Sharma and Shubman Gill provided India a good opening stand. However, the batting collapsed after the opening stand was broken. Rohit's early dismissal in the run chase of 249 in the third ODI triggered a batting collapse again for India as they lost the third ODI by 110 runs.

It was Gautam Gambhir's first ODI series loss. He won the T20I series against Sri Lanka before that as coach, which was his first stint with the Indian cricket team. The Indian batting unit being unable to play spin was one of the major talking points from the series.

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Aakash Chopra has tried explaining in his recent YouTube video as to what the Indian batters did wrong in their attempt to play spin against Sri Lanka.

"See we play the spinners decently well in red-ball cricket. The Indian batters do not face any problems on normal spinning tracks be it red-ball or white-ball cricket. So we play well on spin-friendly pitches.

"But on pitches where there is a little more turn than normal like it was in Colombo, where the ball gets a bit slow and turns and stops and comes onto the bat slowly, it is there that our batters face problems countering spin," said Chopra.

He further took examples of pitches like the ones in Pune, Indore, and recently in Colombo where the pitches offering a little more turn than expected posed problems to the Indian batters. They then look like very ordinary batters and the element of class and confidence is not there.

India's Struggle Against Spin May Just Continue: Aakash Chopra

"We have struggled in pitches like Pune, Indore, and the recent series in Colombo where our batters struggled again spin. Our batters look like ordinary players when batting on pitches that provide a little more extra turn, this has been our problem. We are not practicing enough again spin bowling.

"We are playing white-ball cricket on pitches that are flat and do not offer more turn. These batters do not play domestic cricket enough and even if they play the pitches do not have enough turn to challenge the batters. We have struggled against spin from time to time and that may just continue," Chopra concluded.

The Indian team coped with severe criticism after losing the ODI series against Sri Lanka where they did not play spin well. The Men in Blue play just three more ODIs before the Champions Trophy next year in Pakistan and they need to address this weakness besides finding the core team that can be good enough to win the Champions Trophy.

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