4th Test: Gill needs to trust his spinners more, says Shastri on Sundar’s delayed introduction

Manchester, July 25 Former India head coach Ravi Shastri believes skipper Shubman Gill should have shown more faith in his spinners, citing Washington Sundar’s belated entry into the bowling line-up during the first session of day three’s play in the ongoing fourth Test against England.

Off-spinner Sundar, who took 4-22 in the third Test at Lord’s, was introduced into the bowling attack in the 69th over, a move which left everyone baffled as India missed opportunities to get him earlier in the innings.

"I said on my first commentary stint that Gill has to trust his spinners more. Washington gave him four (second-innings) wickets in the last game. He opened things up for India in the last Test at Lord's.”

“He's confident, so give him a go. Spinners like longer spells. On a day like this you'd expect your spinner to accept responsibility, feel accountable and to go out there and do a job," said Shastri on Sky Sports’ broadcast during lunch break.

He also felt England had the perfect session of Test cricket by amassing 107 runs in 28 overs, as they reached 332/2 in 74 overs and trail India by just 26 runs, with Ollie Pope and Joe Root unbeaten on 70 and 63 respectively.

“England have had a perfect session. They went about their job in an absolute professional manner. They knew what they had to do. They had to negate Bumrah in that first half hour of play, and deny India a wicket. Then you knew with the attack India had, things would go flat because it's great batting conditions.”

“The sun is out. The pitch has flattened out as well and it's hard work now. It's a great chance for England to bat India out of this contest and bat the whole day. Bumrah certainly can't do much, especially when the tactic of the opposition is to see you through.”

“So even if they want to take chances against you, they'll say, he's going to bowl four overs or five overs max in that first spell. After that four four-over spells, let's just play him out and concentrate on the other end,” added Shastri.

Mel Jones, the former Australia women’s cricketer, felt Pope and Root did a great job of putting India under more pressure. "I think we knew right from the get-go that this was going to be a magnificent batting day. And when you've got someone with the class of Joe Root out there, who loves this ground - averaging 65 here - and Ollie Pope, looking for a big series, everything was set up for them."

"They rode things out well, as India were up and about for the first 45 minutes, you could hear it on the stump mic. Pope and Root just wore them down and wore them down. They ran them ragged and put things straight back on India."

Root now needs 57 more runs to overtake second-placed Ricky Ponting in the list of highest run-getters in Tests and Mel feels it’s a prospect which is very exciting. "He went bang, bang to quickly move past Dravid and Kallis. And what I liked about it is he just give a little (nod) to the crowd from the non-striker's end."

"We know it's not what he's about (the stats), but what he is about is scoring big runs and he's doing it again. I kind of like it, and that's coming from an Aussie," she concluded.

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