Ashes 2023: What Team India can learn from ‘Bajball’, England’s cricket style in Test

Joe Root did something extraordinary in the first over of the last session of the first Ashes 2023 Test between England and Australia. The modern great would never have played this shot 15 months ago when he was leading the England Test team. But a lot has changed since Ben Stokes took over and Brendon McCullum became the head coach. We’ll discuss this in more detail later but for now, let’s get back to this shot from the root. The England No.4 opened up his body against Scott Boland and reverse-scooped the ball to the third man region with ease. It’s not a Test match shot, some purists would say, yet it was effective enough as it cost England six runs. But more than that it sent a message to the opposition that even their good balls would be hit hard. Yes, in this format too.

Now going back to the style of cricket that Stokes and McCullum introduced to the world. It is called ‘Baseball’. What is baseball? It is the exact same shot that Root played in the first over of last season. As England revamped their Test side last year after defeats in India and Australia, McCullum, himself a strokemaker, was one of the key changes he made to be aggressive with the bat. England have been playing with this mindset for the last one year. They have also tasted great success by winning series at home and defeating Pakistan in Pakistan.

Root, a classic Test batsman, dropped that tag and adopted ‘Baseball’. England are determined to stick to this brand of cricket come what may, even against world champions Australia during the Ashes. Their ‘buzzball’ mentality was reflected in the way the England batsmen took on Pat Cummins and Co. on the first day of the First Test. Openers Ben Duckett and Zak Crawley scored 22 runs in the first 22 balls and one of them fell. Duckett got out after scoring 12 runs in 10 balls. Crawley scored 61 runs in 73 balls with a strike rate of 83.56. Ollie Pope had a poor outing, but he too scored 31 off 44 balls, at a strike rate of no less than 70. Harry Brook scored his 32 runs at a strike rate of 86.49. Joe Root batted at a strike rate of more than 65 continuously throughout the day. And Jonny Bairstow made a 90-plus score on his Test return after almost a year.

England kept losing wickets but the Three Lions were never in the shell. Compare this with the strike rates of Indian batsmen coming straight from IPL 2023 into the World Test Championship 2023 final (WTC 2023). In the first innings, Rohit Sharma scored 15 runs in 26 balls (SR 57.69), Shubman Gill made 13 runs in 15 balls (86.67). Cheteshwar Pujara scored 14 runs with an SR of 56 while Virat Kohli also scored 14 runs with a low strike rate of 45.16. Ajinkya Rahane played at a strike rate of 68.99 and made a big impact in the first innings. The two batsmen who helped India reach 296 in the first innings – Ravindra Jadeja and Shardul Thakur – played their innings at strike rates of 94.12 and 46.19.

The Indians tried to play the second innings with an attacking mindset but it did not help them as they did not have players who could do that for long. Rohit, Pujara and Virat have been great players for India, but they don’t seem to be the best players for a ‘buzzball’ style of game.

The lesson for India from England’s ‘bassball’ cricket is not just to adopt the new model but also to bring in players who can help implement the style on the ground. Otherwise you will end up with the ugly sight of Pujara helplessly going for the upper cut and getting out. If not, India will have to find its own way of playing Test cricket.

Rishabh Pant is the only Indian batsman who was playing ‘buzzball’ even before the term was coined. KS Bharat was replaced in his place. It was probably like replacing a tank with a pistol on the battlefield. India will not find aggressive batsmen in the Test arena overnight. For that purpose, BCCI should start India A tour and pick such players who will take Indian Test cricket forward. And the forward approach is ‘bazball’. Yashasvi Jaiswal, Prithvi Shaw, Tilak Verma can help transform the Indian Test team. However, he will need India ‘A’ experience before we start improving the national side.