Every defeat does leave a hollow feeling, but the Headingley loss against England is certain to sting this young, transitioning Indian team. It was a game they were well on course to dominate, both in the first and second innings, but collapse errors saw them hand a window of opportunity to their rivals, who simply gate-crashed through to a first-innings victory.Failure of the middle and lower order to build on the strong foundation laid out by the top order, five dropped catches, the inability of the back-up bowling attack to hit consistent areas and lengths and create pressure on the final day where England chased down a target of 331, let the lack of energy when the chips were down be exposed. The reasons are plenty for the management to address.One of them that is certain to rankle head coach Gautam Gambhir is the inability of the lower-middle order and bowlers to contribute with the bat. Take the Headingley Test for example. The final three batters, Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammad Siraj and Prasidh Krishna, were only asked to aggregate just five runs across two innings as England bowlers mopped up the tail in a blink of an eye.In the first innings, India were 307 for four before losing six wickets for 24 runs to settle for a test score of 430.3. On the other hand, England’s tail six batters together gathered 112 runs, which helped them keep their deficit to just six runs.In the second, India were cruising at 333/4 and looked set for a total of 400. But the sorry tale of tail repeated and the visitors lost their last six wickets for 31 runs to be dismissed for 364, a total that eventually proved inadequate.No one is asking the bowlers to score big runs, but handy contributions from them, like even 10s or 20s, will not only swell the team’s total but also help eat into precious time. Just look at England where No 8 Brydon Carse hit 22 off 23 balls and No 9 Josh Tongue managed 11.More than the dismissals, it’s the manner in which the India bowlers got out that is worrisome. It appeared as if they had no confidence in their batting as they just gave room and swung, handing the wickets on a platter to England bowlers. In fact, the tail not wagging enough to sting the opposition has become endemic since Gambhir took charge last July. In the five-match Border-Gavaskar Trophy, barring a half-century from No 8 Washington Sundar in the fourth game in Melbourne and a 22 from No 9 Bumrah in the final game in Sydney, the tail struggled to make an impact as compared to the Australians, where Pat Cummins (159 runs), Mitchell Starc (97) and Nathan Lyon (72) used their bat to good effect.“It’s not that they were not applying themselves,” reasoned Gambhir, defending his bowlers at the post-match press conference here on Tuesday. “Sometimes people fail, not what’s okay. I know it is disappointing. More importantly, they know that we had the opportunity to score 500/6, we could have scored 575 in the first innings, we could have dominated from there.“It’s not that they are not working hard in the nets as well. Sometimes these things happen. Even the pure batters fail as well. So, hopefully, they learn. And hopefully, we come back better in performances from our tail. And that is not the only reason why we lost the Test match, to be honest.”
