Cricket icon Sachin Tendulkar admitted that he was not happy with the way India’s middle batsmen played against Afghanistan at the Rose Bowl in Southampton and felt that the batsmen lacked intent in the middle overs.
Tendulkar, in particular, pointed out the partnership between MS Dhoni and Kedar Jadhav, saying that the duo was just too slow in their approach while batting against the Afghan spinners.
“I felt slightly disappointed, it could have been much better. I was also not happy with the partnership between Kedar and Dhoni, it was very slow. We batted 34 overs of spin bowling and scored 119 runs. This was one area where we didn’t look comfortable at all. There was no positive intent.
“There were more than 2-3 dot balls. After virat got out in the 38th over and till the 45th over we hadn’t scored many runs. There were not enough outings for the middle order batsmen till now and that put pressure on them. But the intent could have been much better by the middle order batsmen,” Tendulkar was quoted as saying to India Today.
Dhoni and Jadhav added a 57-run partnership for the fifth wicket but also played out 84 balls for the same. Dhoni scored 24 off 36 in that partnership while Jadhav made 31 off 48 balls which slowed down India’s proceedings in the middle overs.
India, therefore, managed to post just 224 for 8 in their allotted 50 overs with Virat Kohli top-scoring with 67 runs.
“Kedar Jadhav was under pressure, he had not had an outing up until now. He needed someone to take charge of the situation early on but that did not happen. Both Kedar and Dhoni were not able to play at the required strike rate that they would have wanted. Those in-between overs could have been better and that is why Kedar was under a bit of pressure,” Tendulkar added.
The match turned on its head in the second innings as Afghanistan gave India a tough fight with Mohammad Nabi scoring 52 off 55 balls but the Indian bowling attack led by Jasprit Bumrah fought back really well to bowl out the Afghans for 213.
Mohammed Shami ended up with a hat-trick in the final over to seal the win for India.
Also, Dhoni who has been criticized for playing slow innings in the past was once again at the centre of trolls.
Let us have a look at some of the tweets:
#INDvAFG #MSDhoni Indian fans right now pic.twitter.com/JsMuJDBYYI
— Sachin Goudar (@Sachin__Goudar) June 22, 2019
And the award for best TEST batsman in limited overs cricket goes to #MSDhoni pic.twitter.com/oGfzW9pOKb
— Tejan Shrivastava (@BeingTeJan) June 22, 2019
https://twitter.com/Kumaran67033664/status/1142418428541599744
https://twitter.com/chukidarvicky/status/1142407050707623937
#INDvAFG Ms Dhoni dropped 'Ganguly' because he thought 'Ganguly' was aged and at that time' Ganguly was a far better batsman than Dhoni is for the last couple of years. Dhoni should retire immediately for the betterment of Indian Cricket
— Abhinaba (@Abhinavshy2) June 22, 2019
