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India’s white-ball tour of the United Kingdom has been a disappointment so far. The team first lost the two-match T20I series against Ireland and then suffered another embarrassment in England, where the hosts won the five-match T20I series 3–0 with one game still in hand.
With the T20I series already over, India will now turn their full focus to the upcoming three-match ODI series against England. In this series, India’s experienced icons Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma will return under the captaincy of Shubman Gill. Meanwhile, after the defeat in the Border-Gavaskar Trophy, Gautam Gambhir wanted to make Virat Kohli the Test captain.
Sanjay Bangar reveals the secret of Virat Kohli’s England preparation after 2014 failure
Ahead of the upcoming ODI series, former India batting coach Sanjay Bangar talked about Virat Kohli’s preparation for batting in England. He told how Kohli had worked very hard after struggling during the 2014 England tour.
Bangar shared that Virat Kohli didn’t just move on after that disappointing tour; Rather, he decided to improve his game against swing bowling and spent a lot of time working on his technique before returning to England a few years later and, during that time, he dominated the English attack.
“When you go to England, the whole game depends on two things: how well you counter the swing and how long you can play with the ball,” Sanjay Bangar said on The Great Indian Cricket Show on Doordarshan. “Since Virat Kohli did not perform well during the 2014 tour, he worked hard during 2017-18 to fix it.”
Virat Kohli’s secret against swing bowling?
The former Indian coach has pointed out that batting in England is completely different from batting in many other countries and the biggest challenge is to handle the swinging ball and wait as long as possible before playing each ball. He revealed that Kohli has mainly focused on these two areas. Meanwhile, Gautam is under severe pressure as the BCCI is going to review his tenure after the England series.
Meanwhile, Bangar shared that India’s coaching staff created practice sessions in Mumbai that were designed to feel like English conditions. The players reached the field early in the morning when there was dew on the pitch and humidity in the air. These conditions helped the ball swing more, giving the batsmen valuable practice before traveling to England.
The former RCB coach further explained, “Our routine was brutal; we would be down to the Mumbai ground by 6:00 or 6:30 in the morning to chase the early dew. We wanted to start as early as possible so that we could replicate the English conditions, make use of the heavy morning environment and the natural moisture on the open pitch.”
Wet pitches and brutal practice
Bangar also revealed that when the weather turned pleasant and the pitch started drying out, the coaching staff added water to the surface to maintain moisture in the pitch. This helped the ball continue to spin, making it more difficult to bat during practice.
He further added, “If the sun comes out and the moisture on the wicket starts to go down, we will literally put extra water on the surface to make the ball move around.”
Sanjay Bangar reveals the hard work behind England’s success
He said that Kohli never avoided these difficult sessions. The former India captain kept practicing again and again until he became more confident against swing bowling. Sanjay Bangar believes that this hard work later helped India perform much better in England.
He said that many Indian batsmen benefited from these special training sessions as they had to face similar situations even before the tour started.
Sanjay Bangar said, “Virat did that tough practice again and again. Because our three or four main batsmen managed to improve their batting through those accurate simulations, we were extremely successful in winning the matches there.”
