Former India player Aakash Chopra has said that Shubman Gill was right in having an altercation with Zak Crawley in the third Test against England as well. He also added that the England opener had to be made aware that his time-wasting tactics were wrong too. However, India faced a 22-run loss in the recently concluded third Test against England at Lord’s.
In a video shared on his YouTube channel ‘Aakash Chopra,’ he said, “That altercation, I was reading somewhere that he shouldn’t have done that, that England got motivated because of that, and that Gill was trying to copy someone, and everyone should be their own self. I would say there was nothing wrong in it, to begin with. As a captain, sometimes you feel it’s your duty.”
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“Once you have batted, you want to encourage your bowlers. If Zak Crawley was taking a lot of time, it’s all gamesmanship. We have also done it, and if Crawley was taking time and didn’t want the second over to be bowled, which is absolutely fine, the other side of that is you go and give it to him. He should get to know that what he was doing was wrong,” he further added.
While talking about Shubman Gill’s captaincy, Aakash Chopra opined that the recently appointed captain was following the ball in the first Test and he was at his best with the bat in the second Test too.
“In the first match, he looked like a captain who was following the ball a little. He came into his own as a batter in the second match. Not that he didn’t score runs in the first match, but he scored 250-plus and 150-plus in the second, 430 runs in just one match. He wrote an excellent story for himself at Edgbaston. I think he is doing fine. Sometimes it takes a little time to understand and figure out what needs to be done. Sometimes you become proactive, and become reactive at other times. A lot sort of things are going to happen as it’s a new time for Gill. He is a new captain and might not do everything right,” Aakash Chopra concluded.
