Former Indian Test opener Aakash Chopra slammed India’s fielding in the opening Test against England at Leeds, Headingley, which the home team won by five wickets on Tuesday. India dropped as many as nine catches throughout the Test match, which didn’t help their cause.
On the final day’s play, India was once again not up to the mark, with Yashasvi Jaiswal dropping Ben Duckett’s catch when the England opener was on 97. The left-hander went on to score a match-winning knock of 149 runs in the run-chase of 371.
Furthermore, Indian wicket-keeper Rishabh Pant failed to spot the ball when Ben Stokes ballooned the ball while trying to play a reverse sweep.
In the first innings, Ben Duckett, Ollie Pope and Harry Brook received multiple chances from Indian fielders and it cost the team dearly.
“Catches win matches. It will always be the case, but hold the catches at least. We dropped so many catches. We could have easily seized the initiative in the first innings, but we couldn’t do that, and it was because we aren’t grabbing catches at all. (Jasprit) Bumrah kept getting edges and catches were being dropped. In the end, it seemed like even hope was lost,” Chopra said on his YouTube Channel.
The ball kept following Yashasvi Jaiswal, who had a dreadful Test match as a fielder as he could not take his catches.
“It’s bizarre because Yashasvi Jaiswal is being criticized a lot currently, but he used to catch decently. He is not a bad fielder, but either the confidence has gone down or something else has happened, because when the poor guy drops catches, he drops many. We saw that in the Border-Gavaskar Trophy as well,” he added.
The renowned commentator highlighted that it could have been a different story altogether if Indian fielders had taken their catches in the first innings.
“Try to understand its cascading effect. If we had taken catches in the first innings, the lead would have been 125 to 150 runs. If you had been ahead by 150 runs, it would have meant that Bumrah and the remaining bowlers wouldn’t have bowled too much in the first innings,” he said.
The second Test match between India and England will be played at Edgbaston, Birmingham from July 2nd onwards.
