ENG vs IND | Virat Kohli didn’t play well in second innings, believes Sunil Gavaskar

With their in-form openers, who batted brilliantly in the first innings, India were optimistic when KL Rahul and Rohit Sharma walked down to open the second innings. Starting the day 27 runs behind England at Lord’s, India lost their openers early and the onus fell on the shoulders of Virat Kohli and Cheteshwar Pujara. From 27/2, India fell to 55/3 as Sam Curran scalped Kohli’s wicket just when the skipper seemed in good touch by scoring four boundaries.

Virat Kohli once again disappointed his fans and the team management by committing the same mistakes again. Kohli last scored a ton during the day-night Test against Bangladesh in Kolkata in 2019. Since the start of 2020, Kohli has scored only 387 runs at an average of 24.19 in 16 innings. Looking into Kohli’s dismissal, Sunil Gavaskar asked Kohli to improvise his technique. 

"That method has been successful for him. He has got 8000 Test runs with that back and across movement. But he is playing at deliveries way outside off stump and a little too early in the innings. This time around, the foot is somewhere else, the bat is somewhere else, which means that he hasn’t really played well. It could be about this much-talked-about word intent but in a five-day game, every batsman goes in to score runs. It’s the method that differs," Gavaskar said on the Sony Sports Network.

The Indian skipper looked in good touch with the bat in the first innings at Lord’s as he scored 42 runs to build a century stand with KL Rahul. The skipper’s first innings was defensive but in the second innings, he switched into attacking mode as he scored 20 off 31 balls. However, Sunil Gavaskar asserted that the Indian captain should have played according to the conditions.

“When you talk about this 'trying to take this attack to the opposition' approach, and if that is what intent is, it can get you into trouble like we saw. I think every batsman should be left alone to find his own method. This is a Test match. In ODI and T20I, it’s a completely different situation, but over here, what they need to look into is get themselves in and try to play in the old-fashioned V. Play only when you have fought through," Gavaskar added.