The transition from Suryakumar Yadav to Shreyas Iyer was expected to be smooth sailing. However, the reality has turned out to be completely different after India failed to win a single T20I against Ireland and England. In the seven matches the Men in Blue played, six ended in losses, and the pressure is mounting on head coach Gautam Gambhir. The BCCI has already stated that it would hold a review and take a stock of the team’s performance.
However, amid the raging criticism of Gambhir and the current team management, former India batter Sanjay Manjrekar extended support to the head coach, saying the main cause of the debacle is the flat IPL conditions, where every batter makes merry.
Manjrekar also highlighted how the batters are at sea whenever the ball starts doing something, and urged the BCCI to do the needful and provide more sporting conditions in the IPL, since the next T20 World Cup will be played in Australia.
Also Read: Gautam Gambhir in line of fire for ‘unprofessional’ treatment of Vaibhav Sooryavanshi, Sanju Samson: ‘Confused’
“The easiest thing to do for India would be to sack Gautam Gambhir, sack the captain, sack some of the players who didn’t perform well in Ireland and England. That would be the easy thing to do. The right thing to do would be to identify the main reason for India’s setback. And the main reason is that these T20 matches were played in Ireland and England, in overseas conditions. And our batters and our team were poorly prepared for these conditions. Why? Because the selectors actually picked all these players based on their IPL performances,” Manjrekar said in a video shared on Instagram.
“And here’s a problem. When you do that, what you’ve seen in the last four, five years, something that you’ve seen as well is the IPL puts on a very heavy makeup on Indian batters, all batters. They’ve made it the easiest batting condition. The IPL batting conditions are the easiest I’ve ever seen in my life. And that is why it flatters to be seen. And that is why you see so many batters at the top of the order, you know, doing the crazy things that they do,” he added.
‘Sack people’
Manjrekar also added that the BCCI should look to sack those guys who advised making IPL more popular by having batting-friendly conditions.
“So you don’t really know which player will do well when there is something there for the bowlers. And it’s not as easy as batting on a marble sheet as it’s in the IPL. And that is where the selectors need to be smart and pick people like Shubham Gill, who will succeed in Ireland, England, everywhere as a T20 batter,” said Manjrekar.
“So yes, as I said, simple thing would be to look at the team, but no, go deeper and actually sack those guys who’ve been advising the BCCI that to make IPL more popular and more commercially viable, let’s have more 460, let’s have 200 plus score, because that is how viewership goes, could be true, but then this happens as well. So there you are,” he added.
Under Shreyas, India failed to show any spark, losing 2-0 to Ireland and then 4-0 to England. The batters were all at sea, and the score of more than 200 only came in the fifth and final T20I, and it was also when the target was 258.
With a 4-0 defeat to England, India also lost the No.1 ranking in T20Is and was replaced at the top by the Three Lions.