Former India cricketer turned veteran commentator Aakash Chopra feels that Team India’s Test series defeat to South Africa will hurt them badly, as they were a much-experienced side than the South Africa side as well.
However, India started the series with a win in the Boxing Day Test. But, they faced defeats in Johannesburg and Cape Town, where they failed to defend over 200-run targets as well. With this, India’s hope of registering a maiden Test series win in South Africa was lost too as well.
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While talking about the series loss, in a video shared on his YouTube channel, Chopra said:
“If you do a man-to-man marking with the opposing team, India was a much superior team. You won all the tosses; you allow more than 200 runs to be chased in the fourth innings, that too easily. It means this loss is going to pinch.”
He continued:
“We won the first Test, conquered the Centurion fort, but after that loss at the Wanderers, (we) have now lost in Cape Town. The 2018 loss had hurt, but that was a contest between two evenly matched sides. Batting had let us down there also.”
“South Africa will have to be praised because it is a young side” – Aakash Chopra
Meanwhile, the series defeat is certainly going to be a huge blow for the visitors. They were the favourites coming into the series after their recent success in Tests but failed to do well on South African soils.
“South Africa will have to be praised because it is a young side. It is a team against whom when you started playing, you felt that you start as favourites. When has it happened last time that you have gone to South Africa, England or Australia, where you said that you are the favourites to win, it happens very rarely,” Aakash Chopra added.
“But that was the case here because Anrich Nortje was not there; Quinton de Kock announces his retirement; it is a very young side where Keegan Petersen has played just two Tests before this, Rassie van der Dussen had not scored too many runs; Markram was already in and out. Your team looked much superior in batting, but it did not happen like that,” Aakash Chopra concluded.
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