England’s top batsmen have struggled to get big scores in a tough five-match series against India, but assistant coach Marcus Trescothick on Thursday played down concerns regarding the batting.
England collapsed to 218 all out on day one of the fifth Test in Dharamsala, as Indian spinner Kuldeep Yadav ripped through the opposition top and middle-order after the tourists elected to bat in their bid for a consolation win in the series.
Opener Zak Crawley hit 79 but England crumbled from 175-3, losing Jonny Bairstow (29), in his 100th Test, Joe Root (26) and skipper Ben Stokes — out for a duck — with the score unmoved.
Bairstow’s best has been 38 in nine innings on the tour, with the middle-order batsman managing just 199 runs.
Root shrugged off a poor run with a century in the previous match, and Stokes has failed to convert starts into bigger scores.
“I wouldn’t say it’s necessarily scars emerging, I think they’ve been tested — and you know you always will be in this environment,” Trescothick told reporters.
“It’s a hard place to come and play, results show you that it’s always tricky,” he added.
“Many of the players will look at the success, and how they’ve played to be able to build upon that — and maybe the next time they come, they’ll be better than what they are.”
– ‘Lack of form, confidence’ –
England’s attacking “Bazball” style of play has come under fire after they won the opener but lost the next three Tests, with their batting often letting them down.
Crawley has been England’s best with 407 runs, but he is well behind series leader Yashasvi Jaiswal, who has accumulated 712 runs for India, including two double centuries.
“What is it when players don’t score runs? It’s lack of form, confidence,” said Trescothick.
“That’s what happens; people go through spells where they don’t score the volume of runs,” he added.
“It’s not technical, it can be mental, it can be confidence — all these different things.”
Ollie Pope started the series with a match-winning 196 in Hyderabad, but has since failed to fire as he scored two ducks in the previous loss.
He was out for 11 in the morning session after jumping out to counter Yadav’s spin and getting stumped.
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