Indian team was hoping to win the Centurion test after losing the first test against South Africa in Cape Town. Due to the slow pitch, Team India was expected to return to the series. But nothing like that happened. Even here, the Indian team suffered another heartbreaking defeat. At the same time, the dream of winning the Test series in South Africa also broke.
These are the reasons why India lost the test :
1. Bad openers batting
The biggest problem of the Indian team was their opening batting. Shikhar Dhawan and Murali Vijay were not able to make good score in both innings of the first Test match. When that responsibility was handed over to KL Rahul, he also failed. Rahul scored only 14 runs in both innings of the Centurion Test. Murali Vijay could not have scored a single half century in both the Test matches, his highest score was only 46 runs.
2. Poor Indian batting
The strength of the Indian team is considered to be their deep batting. India’s batting line-up can ruin any great attack of the world. But If you look at Indian batting in the four innings of the Freedom Series, then only two innings can be treated as good innings. Captain Kohli’s innings of 153 runs in Centurion and Hardik Pandya’s innings of 93 runs in Capetown Test. Apart from these two batsmen no other batsman have even scored a half-century.
3. Bad wicket keeping
Team India’s main test wicket keeper Wriddhiman Saha got injured before the second Test, after which Parthiv Patel got the chance in the team. Parthiv is also good wicket keeper batsman. But Parthiv was flop with the bat and his wicket keeping was also poor in both innings of the Centurion Test. Parthiv dropped the catches behind the wicket in both innings of the Centurion Test which cost team India a big loss in the series. Dinesh Karthik has been included in the team for the third Test.
