Former Indian wicketkeeper-batter Farokh Engineer said that the altercation between Shubman Gill and Zak Crawley at the end of Day 3 of the Lord’s Test was more of a distraction for them. After both teams played their respective first innings to a push with 387 runs, England’s openers walked out to bat with seven minutes left until the end of play on the third day. Moreover, Crawley used different time-wasting tactics and eventually became involved in an argument with Indian skipper, Shubman Gill.

While talking about this in an interview with Revsportz, Farokh Engineer said: “When there’s needle in the game—shoulder-to-shoulder stuff—it’s never ideal. Some commentators said it added intensity to the game, which is fine, but it can also be a distraction. In our time, we had altercations too, especially with the Aussies and even the English. But we put them in their place and moved on.”

“Did it affect Shubman and the Indian team? Possibly. It definitely brought England closer as a unit. Shubman is still young as a captain, but he’s doing well. He leads by example, and his batting in English conditions has silenced a lot of critics. He’s a class act,” he again added.

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Farokh Engineer also expressed disappointment over India fumbling in a relatively easy run-chase in the third Test at Lord’s. They faced a dismal top-order collapse and eventually lost by 22 runs as well.

“We should have been 2-1 up instead of trailing. We let England score too many runs, and our main batters didn’t click on the penultimate day. KL Rahul got out cheaply, and the conditions were tough, especially on the last day of a Test match. Still, we should have chased it down,” said Farokh Engineer.

“The way Bumrah and Siraj batted at the end was a bit of a lesson to the top order: if they could hang in there and support Jadeja, why couldn’t the others? We didn’t play clever shots and didn’t have the best of luck—but no excuses. England deserved to win, and they did,” Farokh Engineer concluded.