Australian Phil Hughes’ on-field death in many ways changed Brendon McCullum as a cricketer.
The former New Zealand captain had provided some insights during his MCC Spirit of Cricket lecture, in June 2016, on how Hughes’ fatal injury inspired him to play the game without fear or inhibition about the possible consequences of failure.
McCullum had smashed the fastest hundred in Test cricket against Australia in 2016 (off 54 balls) in his last match in keeping with his new-found perspective, two years after Hughes’ death. “It was so strange, and yet it felt so right, that after Phil’s death we didn’t really care anymore about the result,” McCullum had said at the lecture.
He brought this philosophy into the England Test team as head coach which later evolved from his nickname and got dubbed as Bazball. While the new aggressive brand of cricket has fetched the side a winning percentage of over 72 in less than two years, how they fare in the five-Test series, beginning at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium on Thursday, will determine its efficacy.
Success in India has never come easy and it shows in the hosts’ impregnable record. Since Alastair Cook’s team breached the fortress in 2012-13, no team has managed to win a series here. Only four England captains have won a Test series in India: Douglas Jardine, Tony Greig, David Gower and Cook. Will Ben Stokes manage to add his name to the elite list?
“I think any team that comes to India, it’s always a tough challenge. We respect that as a team as well. But that presents us with an opportunity. This team loves opportunities. We sort of take every opportunity head on and we run towards it. We don’t back away from anything,” Stokes said on the eve of the series.
But how will they live up to the challenge of the spinners on turners? Going into a defensive mode against Ravichandran Ashwin or Ravindra Jadeja can prove to be suicidal.
Considering the traditional attacking instincts in the McCullum-Stokes era, England may prefer to counter-attack their way out of trouble. Such a ploy doesn’t always fetch the desired results and the memories of Ahmedabad and Chennai in 2021 must be fresh in their minds.
The Australians though tried it with limited success during the last Test series in India. Faced with a 78-run target, Travis Head’s 49 off 53 balls fetched them the
only win in Indore. Such blinders often can make the difference in low-scoring contests and Rohit Sharma knows it well. That’s why he is staying cautious.
“By no means whatever record we have in the past decade or so gives us the guarantee that we are going to come out here on top as well, and win the series,” Rohit said on Wednesday. “We still have to play our best cricket; good cricket that we know that we play in these conditions...
“I wouldn’t say we are not beatable. Definitely we are. We want to think that if we don’t step up or if you don’t show up, well, we are going to find ourselves in trouble.”
One Nathan Lyon had managed to keep Bazball under wraps till his injury in the last Ashes which should serve as a glimmer of hope for Rohit.
England though have already brought about a knee-jerk reaction to the conditions with the inclusion of three spinners and just one fast bowler — the injury-prone Mark Wood — in their playing XI. It is the first time in more than 60 years that England will go into a Test with only one specialist pacer.
One of the reasons for England’s success in 2012-13 was the sharp and incisive bowling of their spinners, Monty Panesar and Graeme Swann. Unless Jack Leach, their most experienced spinner, debutant left-arm orthodox Tom Hartley and one-Test old leggie Rehan Ahmed, besides part-timer Joe Root, manage to make an impression, England will cease to have a chance in the series.
