Has a lot to do with playing on flat wickets in T20 – Gambhir on decline in Test batting

India’s head coach Gautam Gambhir has cited the increase in T20 cricket as a reason for batters’ travails in red-ball cricket. He feels that it has brought down the quality of defence, in particular, in batters.

Speaking ahead of the third Test against New Zealand in Mumbai, Gambhir said, “To be a successful Test cricketer, you see people like Virat, you see all the great players who’ve done really well in Test cricket for a long period of time, they’ve always had good defence. The foundation of your batting in Test cricket has to be defence. And then you start taking up from there.”

“Probably has a lot to do with playing on flat wickets in T20,” he added on the topic of a decline in good defensive game in Test cricket. “We need to keep tightening our game. But you will see probably going forward in future, we’ll have the same issues with a lot of other teams as well. Because the more the T20 cricket is played, the lesser people will start defending,” felt Gambhir.

On that note, Gambhir also felt that identifying format-specific players could be a way forward. “See, at the moment it’s difficult to answer this question,” he said when asked about specialists in red-ball cricket. “But going forward, obviously, we will have to identify players who are solid red ball cricketers. Because ultimately, to get the results, you will have to work really hard for 3 or 4 days or 5 days to be honest. So sometimes, as I just mentioned, it’s important if we can bat sessions, we know that we’ve got the bowling attack to take 20 wickets. At the moment, it’s difficult to answer,” he said.

Soon after Gambhir had spoken, Shubman Gill was out practicing his defence against the left-arm spin bowlers in the nets. As many as four of them operated in tandem, as Gill went about practicing his defence for the majority of the time. Gambhir believed that even for players at this level, and in different formats, it is possible to up their defensive game.

“To a certain extent, yes you can,” said Gambhir. “To a certain extent, it has to come from the individual as well. That how much value does he end up giving it in defending the ball? That is something which is very important. And especially on a turning track. Because I’ve always believed that the best players and the most successful players in this format, or be it any format, always had solid defense. So that is something which we keep talking about. And it is not the overnight thing that we’re going to talk about it today and people will start getting better tomorrow. But it’s a continuous process. We need to keep working on it. We need to keep telling people the importance of defense. And all that stuff. So I feel that I think guys are really working hard on it. And you’ll see the results in the future as well. And that is something which is very, very important, especially in red-ball cricket,” said the India head coach.

India find themselves 0-2 down at home and suffered collapses on a dry surface in Pune which cost them the series. Gambhir reiterated his point about growing with the times when it comes to the defensive game.

“We need to keep defending better. I think that is something which is important. Especially on a turning track. Because if you’ve got confidence on your defence, a lot of things can be sorted. And that is something which we need to keep getting better, keep working on. Because, again, I’ll keep going back to the same answer that a lot has to do with limited over-cricket and when you’re muscling the ball, that you end up forgetting the soft hands and all that stuff, which probably used to happen 8 or 10 years back. That is why I said that a complete cricketer is a cricketer who plays T20 format really successfully and also Test cricket really successfully. He can adapt his game. And that is what growth is. Growth is not only going about hitting the ball in the stands. It’s also about batting sessions on a turning track, where you know that you will not be able to hit in the stands, but you will be able to rotate better. For that, I think the foundation is very, very important.”