During the third Test against India in Rajkot, England opener Ben Duckett made a bizarre statement, saying that their aggressive approach, also known as Bazball, should be credited for Yashasvi Jaiswal’s explosive hundred (214* off 236 balls).
Duckett suggested that England’s aggression with the bat has forced their opponents to play differently in the longest format.
However, former England skipper Nasser Hussain has dismissed Duckett’s theory and instead asked the visiting batters to introspect and learn how to pace their innings from the young Jaiswal.
“So the comment on Jaiswal, he’s learned from us. Again, I’m going to touch on that. He’s not learned from you. He’s learned from, as I say, his upbringing and all the hard yards he had to put in growing up, and he’s learnt from IPL,” Hussain told Mike Atherton on Sky Sports Cricket.
“If anything, lads have a look at him (Jaiswal) and learn from him. So whatever they’re saying in public and in that dressing room, I hope they’re going back to their room and just a little bit of a self-introspection and going, yeah, I can look at that lad and learn from him. I can improve,” he added.
In this series so far, Yashasvi Jaiswal has amassed 545 runs from six innings at an average of 109 and a strike rate of 81.10, including two double tons and a half-century.
For Nasser Hussain, Jaiswal’s performance has been the ‘wow moment’ and he hailed the left-hander as one of India’s finest players of spin bowling, putting him in the category of Virender Sehwag, Vinod Kambli and Navjot Singh Sidhu.
“Jaiswal for me has just been a wow moment. He has just been unbelievable. And again, I’ve just talked about how England’s spinners can learn from Indian spinners. I think some of England’s batters can learn from Jaiswal. He is attacking, he is hitting sixes for fun. I sit at home and I watch cricket still as a batter, and think, what shot would I have played? So the moment England spinners get it above the eye line, I pick that up and Jaiswal picks that up and belts it out of the ground. Literally every time I sit home going, always toss that up. Jaiswal belts it out of the ground. I’ve not seen, you’d have to go back to Vinod Kambli or (Navjot) Sidhu when you played on that tour, or Virender Sehwag, some of the great hitters of spin. I think you would put this young lad in,” Hussain stated.
“And I said on a previous podcast we’ve done, he’s got that hunger from moving as a twelve-year-old boy and living on Azad Maidan in a tent. He’s got that hunger and discipline, but he’s also got that IPL hitting potential and flair. And that is a dangerous combination as England are finding out – two double-hundreds and big runs. And that’s why England, yeah, play the way you are. But have a look at this lad. He’s playing attacking, but he’s making it count. He’s sitting in. First hour, he didn’t go after England. Second hour, he went after their spinner. So a brilliant performance from him,” he further remarked.
India are leading the five-match Test series 2-1 after winning the Rajkot Test. The fourth Test is slated to be held in Ranchi from February 23.
