Hyderabad: It's a sport in the end. That's what the optimists say. For the staunch fans, lustily clapping, cheering, and screaming to break all the pre-decided decibels of noise of a developed country, the loss would mean the breaking of hearts and a long wait.
The wait, meanwhile, has continued for the past decade and this crushing by the English side would hurt even more. As this Indian side looked more settled having won most of their bilateral series, albeit the Asia Cup. For the readers of the game, the emotions must be dropped down to understand the practical side of it, dissect and analyse to understand how and which facet of the game the team was lacking. ETV Bharat takes a look:
Read: So near and yet so far: India choke at another ICC event, lose to England by 10 wickets
Powerplay overs: India just couldn't score in the powerplay overs having lost KL Rahul (5 from 5 balls) early into the innings. Rohit Sharma slow scoring (27 runs from 28 balls) didn't help as the run-rate went down in the most crucial phase of the innings. It appeared he tried to push the accelerator button but the patchy form didn't help as a miscued shot went for a catch. India scored 38-1 in the powerplay overs whereas England were 63-0 at the end of 6 overs.
England got wickets at regular intervals: Right at the onset, England were bang on target, not allowing Indian batters to free their arms. The slower-ones, cutters were put to good use.
India's fall of wickets:
9-1 (Rahul, 1.4), 56-2 (Rohit, 8.5), 75-3 (Suryakumar Yadav, 11.2), 136-4 (Kohli, 17.6), 158-5 (Pant, 19.3), 168-6 (Hardik Pandya, 19.6)
The above fall of wickets reflects how India could never go bang bang due to loss of wickets regularly, save for the time when Hardik Pandya was at the crease, but it was too late to go all guns blazing.
The Openers:
Half-centuries may have came for KL Rahul in this tournament but he somehow fails to go big in the big matches. Aside from playing slow throughout the tournament, he hasn't really gone big when it has mattered the most. While skipper Rohit Sharma looked patchy througout the World Cup, unable to go for the clean-hits and pulls that he plays with so much confidence. On the other hand, the England opening duo gave India's star-studded line-up a lesson in how to build a T20 innings: that there is only one way, the offensive way.
India's insipid bowling:
Bhuvneshwar and Arshdeep Singh didn't get enough swing up front and team management's fascination to play Axar Patel (0/30 in 4 overs) and Ravichandran Ashwin (0/27 in 2 overs) ahead of Yuzvendra Chahal backfired badly. The success England spinner Adil Rashid (1/20 in 4 overs) on the same track added insult to the injury.
