ENG v IND 2018: Team India need to walk the talk on overseas tours, says Virender Sehwag

Prior to the England tour, Ravi Shastri had talked about Indian players' resolve to be the best travelling side in the world.

Sehwag was surprised to see the struggle of Indian batsmen against Moeen Ali | Getty

Moeen Ali claimed nine wickets in the match as England registered a series-clinching victory over India in the fourth Test at The Ageas Bowl, Southampton on Sunday (September 2).

Chasing 245 for a win, India were bundled out for 184. England won the match by 60 runs and took an unassailable 3-1 series lead in the five-match Test series.

Seeing the way India’s batting unit capitulated once again in the series, legendary opening batsman Virender Sehwag slammed the team and asked them to walk the talk. Prior to the England tour, the Indian team management including the head coach Ravi Shastri had talked about Virat Kohli and company’s resolve to be the best travelling side in the world.

"Best travelling teams are made by performances on the ground and not by sitting in the dressing rooms and talking about it. One can talk whatever they want to talk about but unless the bat does the talking, they can never become the best travelling team," Sehwag told India TV.

He was surprised to see the struggle of Indian batsmen against Moeen Ali. The English off-spinner had bamboozled the visiting batters in the first innings, scalping 5 for 63 and he followed it up with 4 for 71 in the second essay.

"Even the last time they played here, Moeen Ali emerged as the highest wicket-taker amongst spinners on the tour. I think he bowled better than Ashwin even though the English batsmen played spin better than our batsmen. Even though it's believed that subcontinental batsmen play spin rather well. But we should give England the credit for batting and bowling better in the second innings," Viru added.

Sehwag was also disappointed with Kohli’s remarks after the series defeat. Addressing the post-match media conference, Kohli had said that he was pleased with the way his troops competed in the series.

"We already learnt the art of winning single Test matches under Sourav Ganguly but we also couldn't win a series overseas. So the problems are still the same. But the difference then was that our batsmen used to score runs but we didn't have the bowling to take 20 wickets. Nowadays we have the bowling to do that but not the batsmen who can score runs,” the swashbuckling opener asserted.

"We haven't scored more than 300 runs in an innings in the last few Tests, except maybe once or twice. It is very easy to say that 'we are trying', 'we are not able to cross the line' or 'we will try in the next series' but we have been repeating these statements for a decade now and we still haven't won a series in Australia, England and South Africa in this period," he concluded.

 
 

By Salman Anjum - 04 Sep, 2018

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