England has always been a tough place for India when it comes to Test cricket. Just three series wins in the country in 18 tours since 1932 tell us why.
One of those wins came as late as 2007. However, India have looked totally out of depth in their last three tours to England and have won just two out of the 15 Tests, including the World Test Championship Final against New Zealand, they have played in the country since 2011. That means India have lost three consecutive series, and the precious WTC trophy as well, in the last 10 years.
As India gear up for another testing series against the hosts, things are going to be equally difficult for them once again. While the pace attack has improved considerably over the last two tours, the failure of their batsmen — the openers in particular — to deal with these conditions has been one of the main reasons behind their recent struggles.
To be fair, opening is never an easy job in England. Most visiting teams struggle in this area, but the Indian openers have been among the worst of the lot.
Only the South African openers have a lower batting average than that of India among visiting teams who have batted in at least 10 innings in England since 2014. Their batting average of 25.43 is only marginally better than that of South Africa's 25.25. When it comes to occupying the crease, they have faced 54.13 deliveries per innings. Only Australian openers (50.1) have done worse.
Looking at these figures, it becomes very clear that the success of the Indian openers is extremely important for India to end their winless run in England.
With Shubman Gill ruled out of the entire tour due to an injury, the onus will be on the experienced Rohit Sharma and Mayank Agarwal to give India a strong base to build on.
The Indian team management did send an email to the selectors asking for Prithvi Shaw and Devdutt Padikkal, who are in Sri Lanka for the white-ball series, as replacements for Gill.
Their request, however, was denied by the BCCI later on, and it is quite understandable as Agarwal and Bengal's Abhimanyu Easwaran and KL Rahul had traveled with the squad as backup openers already. So, adding two more young players like Shaw and Padikkal, who don't have much experience playing in the English conditions at this level, to the squad didn't make sense.
The entire matter created a lot of buzz on social media as well. The request for Shaw and Padikkal wasn't received well by anyone.
It seemed too unfair on Agarwal, Rahul, and Easwaran, and probably too much to ask from Padikkal and Shaw.
But now that the request has been denied by the BCCI, the Indian think-tank in England has no other choice than making the best out of the three options available to them.
India will have high hopes from Rohit Sharma in particular, who has undergone a massive transformation as an opener in red-ball cricket of late. Even though he is yet to get a big score as an opener in overseas Tests, he has looked quite assured in his approach.
The 34-year-old has scored just one fifty in the six innings he has played away from home this year, but he has faced more than 60 deliveries in five of those outings. On average, he has faced approximately 70 deliveries in each of his overseas innings this year.
It indicates that Rohit is doing well to see off the new ball. It's just that he needs to kick on and get big scores. Everyone knows how much he is capable of doing that and it won't be a surprise if we see England falling victim to his hunger for runs in this series. The same can't be said about Agarwal, Rahul, and Easwaran, though.
Agarwal has a string of low scores to his name in Tests that date back to February 2020. All of his last eight innings have come in the overseas conditions of New Zealand and Australia, where he has amassed a total of just 88 runs at a poor average of 11. He has been out for single-digit scores in six out of these eight innings and that really sums up his struggles of late.
As far as things for Rahul go, the last time he played a Test match was in August 2019. He was dropped from the side for a poor run of form as well. The 29-year-old had amassed just 195 runs at an average of 17.72 in the 12 innings prior to that. Even though he has been with the white-ball side regularly during this period, and has scored heaps of runs in the format as well, it won't be wise to expect him to do the same in Tests. When he was dropped, it was pretty clear that he was struggling to adapt across formats. It remains to be seen if he has made any changes to his technique and approach this time to deliver in Tests.
Even Easwaran, who averages a healthy 43.57 in first-class cricket with over 4,000 runs to his name, doesn't inspire much confidence due to the rough patch he went through in the last Ranji season.
The 25-year-old scored only 258 runs at an average of 17.20 during the 2019-20 Ranji Trophy campaign. With the 2020-21 Ranji season canceled amid the pandemic last year, he has been short of some much-needed competitive red-ball practice as well.
This series is already going to be mentally challenging for all the players but more so for Agarwal, Rahul and Easwaran as they don't have form in their favour.
Moreover, all three of them will be competing for one opening slot throughout the course of the series and that could always put extra pressure on them.
In such circumstances, it becomes pivotal for Rohit to carry his good form forward as his assured presence at one end could ease the pressure off his opening partner at the other end.
India's chances of success in this series hinges a lot on how the openers perform. They will have to believe that they are good enough to withstand the tough challenge posed by these English conditions, despite the odds and numbers stacked against them.
(Prasenjit Dey is freelance cricket journalist based out of Kolkata. Cricket runs through his veins and writing has always been his passion. He is now a part of both worlds, trying to make a difference by writing on the nitty-gritty of the game.)
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