England drew the series from India even when they were up 2-1 against India and lost the last Test match from the winning momentum. The coach Brendon McCullum, the head coach of England, says he has identified some areas where England needs to improve ahead of the Ashes.
“We’ll let this one sit, we’ll digest it,” McCullum said. “We’ll be able to pick out what has gone well then start to work out how we can keep improving so, when we do arrive in Australia, we give ourselves a huge chance.
“We’re in the middle now, halfway through what we knew was going to be an unbelievable 12 months of Test cricket. We know we’ve got some room to improve.
“You’re always learning any time you get to see guys having to dig deep and go to places they’ve maybe not been before.
“There’s lots to pick out as we give ourselves time for this to digest and work out areas we can look to improve for our next challenge. Ultimately, I’m really proud of the guys and their efforts. It’s been a combative series, it’s taken its toll with injuries, some of the best players have gone home injured.
“To sit here at 2-2, yes, you’re disappointed but you’re proud of the efforts.”
Reluctant to focus on the lost chances, McCullum attributes this to the expense of playing a top-tier squad that recovered from those breaks. He did admit that the catching was especially poor; in India’s second innings of 396, England missed six catches, losing them 152 runs.
“We didn’t catch very well in this game but have caught really well over the last few years,” he said. “Sometimes dropped catches happen and one leads to another. If we had held our catches maybe we would have stood on the other side of the result. That’s life, there’s so many little things in the game we could pick out and have huge impacts. We are a good fielding unit and had a bit of an average performance in this Test.
“We threw everything at them. It was testament to how stoic they are as a team. We knew when they turned up in England it would be a very stern challenge and we’d have to play excellent cricket to get the result we wanted.
“Ultimately I thought it was an absolutely unbelievable series to be part of. It had confrontation, it had stalemates, it had passion and it had some sub-par performances under pressure as well.
“The way India were late on in this Test, Mohammed Siraj has the absolute heart of a lion to bowl 90mph in his 30th over of his fifth Test match. It’s quite an incredible effort.
“As much as we got ourselves in a winning position in this Test match, I feel like they deserved to win. They played better cricket.”
It is eminent to mention that Australia and England will engage in a five-match Test series known as Ashes from November 21st to January 4th.
