British press lambasts India's performance

The Indian cricket team found itself at the receiving end of scathing criticism by the British media following its humiliating innings and 244-run drubbing in the fifth and final Test with Geoffrey Boycott calling the visiting batsmen “lambs to the slaughter.”

“India were pathetic when they had to bat and bowl on two seaming, swinging pitches at Old Trafford and the Oval,” Boycott wrote in his column in the ‘Daily Telegraph’.

“Their batsmen lacked application and the technique to handle two of the best Test bowlers in the world in James Anderson and Stuart Broad. On these sort of pitches they are a handful for any batsmen and these talented kids had no experience of such conditions. The Indian batsmen were like lambs to the slaughter.”

The Independent said, “The reputation of India’s batsmen has undergone its own mini volte-face as well, with Virat Kohli suffering even more than the rest.

“He arrived being lauded as the only man who could challenge AB de Villiers for the title of best batsman in all formats of the game, he ends the series with an average of 13.40 and only 22 runs more than James Anderson, who batted five innings less – nobody’s calling him the new Tendulkar any more.”

“Their batting has become woeful, their final capitulation of the series so diabolical you imagine Geoffrey Boycott could chunter on about its ineptitude for the remaining two and a half days that this match was scheduled to go on for,” it wrote.

“India have performed so lamentably since their victory at Lord’s that it is hard to gauge the scale of England’s improvement. At The Oval and at Old Trafford the impression was that Derbyshire would have rolled the batsmen over without much resistance,” said ‘The Guardian’.