Sanjay Manjrekar slammed Ravindra Jadeja as he felt that the experienced spinner was tactically inept during India’s loss in the first Test against England in Leeds. Jadeja picked up just one wicket across both innings and conceded 172 runs in 47 overs. However, it was the veteran spinner’s inability to use the conditions on Day 5 that caught the attention of pundits.
Speaking on ‘Match Centre Live’ on JioHotstar, Manjrekar said the track had rough patches that Jadeja could have exploited and more was expected from an experienced campaigner like him.
“It’s not fair to be overly critical of younger players like Prasidh Krishna — there are obvious areas for improvement. But I am going to be critical of Ravindra Jadeja. This was a final-day pitch with rough patches for him to exploit. And while there were a couple of chances, we have to expect more from someone of his experience,” said Manjrekar.
Manjrekar felt that the conditions on Day 5 weren’t like the usual ones in England and Jadeja didn’t use the rough well against Ben Duckett and it was only late into the England opener’s knock that he started to employ the trick.
“These weren’t typical English conditions where the pitch offers nothing. I felt he didn’t use the rough nearly enough — especially against Ben Duckett. Against Ben Stokes, yes, he did make an effort. But it was only much later in Duckett’s innings that Jadeja started using the rough properly,” said Manjrekar.
‘I felt Jadeja was disappointing’
Manjrekar went on to say that we expect a higher level of tactical awareness from a player like Jadeja and he was disappointing in on the final day of the match.
When you’re dealing with experienced bowlers and seasoned batters, you expect a higher level of tactical awareness. Somewhere, I felt Jadeja was disappointing. The seamers had no help from the surface — but Jadeja at least had something in the pitch working in his favour,” said Manjrekar.
India and England will play the second Test in Birmingham from July 2.
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