Legendary Indian batter Sunil Gavaskar feels the aggressive approach shown by the batters in securing a remarkable seven-wicket win over Bangladesh in the rain-hit second Test at Kanpur should be named after skipper Rohit Sharma.
Although two days of action at the Green Park Stadium were lost to rain and a wet outfield, India still came all guns blazing on the first innings with the bat by setting new records for the fastest 50, 100, 150, 200, and 250 scores in the longer format, before declaring at 285/9. They then chased down 95 in 17.2 overs to complete a blazing win and seal the series 2-0.
As one saw in India last year, this strategy does not work in Tests and will surprise the opposition at best for two games. While one paper commented upon the Indian batting as 'Bossball' because the 'boss' of the team, Rohit, had shown the way, some from the old powers referred to it as 'Gamball' after the Indian coach, Gautam Gambhir.
This completely changed the approach of the English batting line-up under the new regime of Ben Stokes and McCullum, but we have seen over the last couple of years that Rohit has been batting like this and encouraging his team to do so as well. Gambhir has only coached for a couple of months, so attributing this approach to him is some real-time foot-licking of the highest quality.
"Gambhir himself hardly ever batted in this fashion like McCullum used to do. If any credit is due, it is solely to Rohit and nobody else. Instead of using the words this-ball or that-ball, I would suggest using the skipper's first name, Rohit, and term it the 'Gohit' approach.". Hopefully, brainier people will come up with a trendier name for this than the lazy option of calling it after 'Bazball'," wrote Gavaskar in his column for Sportstar on Monday.
He also wondered if India had batted in the same manner when Test matches weren't worth World Test Championship points, with the top two teams from the current cycle to play the final at Lord's next year.
"That day's batting set up the game for India to secure a win on the final day and earn the much-needed points required to be in the race for a place in the World Test Championship (WTC) finals in June next year."
"Would that approach have been taken had there been no runs up for grabs and no qualification required to the WTC final? Having lost two full days of play, with the team batting first still having seven wickets in hand, not many teams in the past would have even glanced at a result and would have been happy to play out the last two days for personal milestones and record books."
So full marks to the ICC for creating the World Test Championship and thereby making every Test match, including a dead rubber, important for the points teams can accrue from them. Every Test match thus has context and has livened up the long format, with teams wanting a win and looking to make things happen by trying something new and innovative.".
However refreshing and thrilling the Indian batting was in the Kanpur Test match, let's face it: would they have batted in the same manner if there were no points on offer? The much-maligned ICC deserves every bit of applause for changing the perception towards every Test match by creating the World Test Championship.". India knew they had some tough games coming in and hence had to try and get as much as they could when playing in India, " explained Gavaskar.
The next hurdle for table-toppers India will be the Kiwis, who arrive at Bengaluru to play a three-match Test series here from October 16 to November 5 in Bengaluru, Pune, and Mumbai. "Bangladesh is done and dusted, and now it's the Kiwis who will be in the firing line of Rohit and his boys. Will they overpower them as they did Bangladesh? We shall soon find out," concluded Gavaskar.
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