Gavaskar goes soft on Indian cricketers

India suffered a humiliating innings defeat against England in the fourth Test to continue with their disappointing recent form overseas in the longest format but former captain Sunil Gavaskar was not ready to criticise the young players and pleaded the public to keep faith on them.

“The team is in transition as some of the best players in the world have retired a few years back. It is difficult for these youngsters to fill into their big shoes. We need to be a little bit patient with them,” Gavaskar said.

“I agree that India has been struggling in Test format for some time. But look, with those some of the best players in the world, India still lost 0-4 to England and then with identical margin to Australia in 2011. So, I will not just point a finger on these current players,” he said.

England off-spinner Moeen Ali tormented the Indians at the Old Trafford with figures of 4/39 in the second innings but Gavaskar refused to buy the line that Indians were no longer the best players of spin.

“Apart from the one delivery which dismissed Virat Kohli, I would not say that Moeen had bowled some extraordinary deliveries or which turned a lot. It was just that the Indians wanted to score runs off him as they were not getting boundaries from the other end from the likes of James Anderson,” he said.

“They thought they could score some easy runs from Moeen. If you are not getting runs from one end, you naturally try to get runs from the other. It happens in cricket and players may get out in doing that. That had happened to the Indians. One should not generalise things,” Gavaskar told NDTV.