Sunil Gavaskar, the cricket legend, has called out England for being sulky. This after India rejected England’s proposal to end the 4th Test on the fifth day despite the match looking like a tie.
Gavaskar said England can’t always get what they want and shouldn’t complain when they don’t. He said England has a habit of thinking what they do is right but when others do the same, it’s wrong. Gavaskar added those days are over and the Indian team won’t accept that attitude.
Why Was Stokes Angry?
Ravindra Jadeja and Washington Sundar were batting for India and refused to stop playing early and continued till they got their centuries. Ben Stokes, the England captain, was not happy because he thought they should have accepted the offer to end the game early since they had already saved the Test match.
Gavaskar said if England didn’t want Jadeja and Sundar to get centuries, they should have used their best bowlers instead of using part-time bowlers to show their annoyance.
Gavaskar said some English players were not happy that the Indian batters turned down the offer to stop playing for the day, near the end of the Test match.
Gavaskar added that the England players thought since there was no chance of winning, the Indians should have agreed to end the game. But they seemed to forget that both teams are playing and if one team wants to continue, the other team has to accept it.
They also forgot how hard the batters worked and how strong they were against the main bowlers for more than four hours to get close to their 80s. England should have stopped them with good bowlers instead of complaining about them scoring runs against Harry Brook. Gavaskar said getting a Test century is not easy and doesn’t happen in every match, so the batters had the right to continue playing and reach their personal goals.
England’s Mischief
Gavaskar said if he was the captain of India in Manchester, he would have told his batters to keep batting till the end of the day in response to England’s behaviour.He would have told them to keep batting and play all the remaining overs to exhaust the fielders, especially after what the English did when their offer was rejected.
Gavaskar said the light was getting dim and the lights were on. If Jofra Archer and Brydon Carse were bowling, the umpires might have stopped the game. So England missed out there.