England stamped their authority over the Indians, keeping them virtually out of the Birmingham Test by piling on 456 runs for the loss of just three wickets, thus taking 232 runs lead by the end of second day's play on Thursday.
As this Test match and series progress, surely more humiliation beckons for this Team India. It has been men against boys in this match and same has been the case in the series.
This Team India are looking out of sorts in every department, fielders are unable to hold on to catches, bowlers don't have that much talent in themselves to pick twenty wickets and batsman are not gutsy enough to face the seaming conditions.
The prime example of this is Alastair Cook, the only English players who was struggling in the series for runs came good on the second day of the third Test, when he smashed Indian bowlers all over the park and came back in the form in fine fashion.
Rather than attacking him, India bowlers allowed him to cut lose and allowed him to call the shots. He is just 18 short of what would be a brilliant double century. But this has been the case for Team India over the years. Team India have always been the bunny of out-of-form players whether it was the case of Saeed Anwar's 194 in 1997 or whether it has been Shivnarine Chanderpaul who has most of the time scored runs against Indian attack.
The way this English side has humiliated Team India, it has put question marks over many Indian players. Suresh Raina who has been seen as the future Indian skipper has been one of the biggest flop show. Going by his dismissal in the first innings of the third Test, he cannot even play a straight ball forget about the short pitched stuff. Virat Kohli or Rohit Sharma any day would have been a better bet than overt hyped Raina.
It's not just Raina, MS Dhoni has been inconsistent in past few years, Yuvraj Singh is good but not good enough in Tests.
This Indian team has always won matches because of their batting and what we have seen on this tour is that batsmen just can't handle swing and bounce. This is a big question mark on their skills and technique. Most of the matches India has won off late has been on the flat pitches and when they were tried and tested in the Western conditions like South Africa and now in England they have struggled though they somehow managed to draw the series in South Africa.
In the bowling department, if BCCI or anyone related to India cricket think they can win a match with Sreesanth and Ishant Sharma as their spearhead bowlers, they need a reality check. They are the most inconsistent bowlers in the world cricket. in one session they seems to be unplayable and in the other they are thrashed all around the park. How has Sreesanth manged to be in the team is just beyond anyone's imagination. He is not a bowler to play at international stage. Period.
Off-spinner Harbhajan Singh's performance minus Zaheer Khan has been similar to Sreesanth and others. He has been struggling with his line and length and is not even confident to flight the delivery to the batsmen or take risks.
Praveen Kumar has been a bright light but he lacks the pace that could really trouble the batsmen.
Let's talk about Mr. Duncan Fletcher. First series against West Indies was not a vintage win, they just scrapped to a 1-0 win in the Test series against a team that has been struggling off-late. When Fletcher had a chance to prove himself at the biggest stage, he came up short. He is the same man who changed the fortunes for the England team in the past and even won Ashes series with them. But when he was appointed India's coach there were question marks over him?
Whether he is the right man to manage the World Champions and with the current form the answer is pretty simple, NO!
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