Former Indian national cricket team wicketkeeper-batsman Parthiv Patel criticized Rohit Sharma’s captaincy in the first match of the Test series against the New Zealand national cricket team.

Rohit Sharma & Co. did not look at their best in the first Test of the three-match series against the Blackcaps at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bengaluru despite starting the series with a dominant 2-0 win over Bangladesh. at home.

India lost the first Test against New Zealand by 8 wickets

India won the toss and decided to bat first in the match. The decision backfired as they were bowled out for 46, which was their lowest score in the history of Test cricket at home and third lowest overall.

Then with the ball, India were below par and struggled mightily against Rachin Ravindra and Tim Southee, allowing the visitors to post a mammoth total of 402 runs on the board.

It took a special effort from the Indian batsmen to get back into the match and that’s what they did. Yashasvi Jaiswal and Rohit Sharma started well before Virat Kohli took charge and played a brilliant innings.

However, the best performances came from the bat of Sarfaraz Khan, who scored 150 runs, and Rishabh Pant, who scored 99.

India reached the score of 462 and set a target of 107 runs for New Zealand, which they chased on the final day with 8 wickets in hand to claim a victory.

Rohit Sharma’s captaincy was definitely a bit of a surprise – Parthiv Patel

While defending a small total, Rohit Sharma started Jasprit Bumrah and Mohammed Siraj and brought in the team’s top-scorer Ravichandran Ashwin only when the opposition needed 10 runs to win.

During a discussion at Colors Cineplex, Parthiv Patel was surprised by Rohit Sharma’s tactic of introducing Ravichandran Ashwin very late in the attack. He said Ashwin should have opened the bowling along with Jasprit Bumrah. He elaborated:

“It was a little surprising because you want your main pitcher to pitch as much as possible. In fact, we were discussing whether or not he would pitch with the new ball because he’s even more effective with the new ball, especially when he pitches in the fourth innings.

“So Rohit Sharma’s captaincy was definitely a bit surprising. When he (Ashwin) came to bowl two overs, he also beat the batsman two or three times. I feel that when he (Rohit) looks back or goes to the conference press, They will definitely ask him why he didn’t bowl to Ravichandran Ashwin.”

India might have lost the Test, but I still don’t feel the decision was wrong – Parthiv Patel

Rohit Sharma was heavily criticized for India’s decision to bat first in the match and the captain openly accepted his mistake in reading the pitch in the press conference. However, Parthiv Patel felt that India’s decision to bat first was not wrong. Parthiv Patel explained:

“India might have lost the Test, but I still don’t feel that decision was wrong. It is true that the way India batted and got out for 46, they fell far behind in the game. However, I don’t think that decision out Even after that, India had chances to come back in the Test match.

“When Rachin Ravindra and Tim Southee had a 130-plus run partnership, you had a chance. After that, when Sarfaraz Khan and Rishabh Pant were batting and Sarfaraz got out, you had a chance to build partnerships. If you had taken the target of 110 runs at 170 or close to 200, it would have been a different game.”