Sachin Tendulkar Decodes How Team India Lost The Adelaide Test

Master Blaster Sachin Tendulkar has reckoned that the lack of footwork by the Indian batsmen during the second innings of the Adelaide Test played a major role in them getting knocked over for the fifth-lowest total and their record lowest in Test history- 36.

India was marginally ahead of the game at the start of the third day of the pink-ball Test after having taken a 53-run lead following the completion of the first innings of both sides. But they squandered all the advantage in a maniac first session of the third afternoon as Josh Hazlewood and Pat Cummins produced a masterclass in seam bowling to skittle the Virat Kohli-led team for 36.

Tendulkar, in an interview with IANS, felt that the Indian batsmen showed a lot of resilience in the first innings, but in the second innings, the batsmen did not play or miss a lot of deliveries, and, according to him, it was largely because of the consistency in dishing out fullish length outside off-stump by the Australian seamers but also due to the half-hearted stride by the Indians.

“I thought in the first innings we batted well and showed a lot of resilience. In the second innings, there was not much playing and missing by our batsmen. The ball wasn’t moving around too much; just a little bit. Normally, when batters score runs we don’t look at other elements, like the number of times he was beaten etc.,” Sachin Tendulkar told IANS.

“But we talk about a number of aspects when the batter has edged the ball. Off similar deliveries, when you are beaten and when you are scoring runs, nobody talks about those. One change that one can talk about was getting a nice, big stride forward, which I felt was missing. In foreign conditions, I feel with a good stride forward against fast bowlers becomes important,” he explained.

“A half-and-half defence (short stride) can always trouble you and if there’s a little more movement off the seam then your hands tend to compensate for the lack of footwork. What I also simultaneously noticed was that the Australians bowled very much on off stump — much, much tighter — and not outside the off stump whereas they bowled outside the off stump in the first innings,” he said.

Indian batsmen will look to stage redemption when they lock horns against the same bowling attack during the Boxing Day Test at the MCG.

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