Why the England series’ Shreyas Iyer is living on borrowed time

Why the England series’ Shreyas Iyer is living on borrowed time? It was furious, Kevin Pietersen. “Listen, these are the days these guys are going to look back and say, ‘oh why did I not get a hundred?’ when Kohli and other guys [KL Rahul and Ravindra Jadeja] come back. I was able to obtain the hundred’. After the first innings of the second Test at Vizag, the former England batsman—now a television pundit—furled, saying, “And when you are sloppy like that, getting out doesn’t impress me at all.” India’s No. 4 player, Shreyas Iyer, was the target of his rage.

Now that Virat Kohli isn’t playing but the “other guys” are back, Iyer still has to perform. Fortunately for him, his opponent Rajat Patidar failed to score either, so it should be an interesting shootout between the two to determine who gets to stay in the team when the third Test begins in Rajkot on February 15. India may prefer the more blatantly aggressive Iyer in the mix now that Rahul is back, but you never know. Iyer is the one who brought it to this point.

From his limited Test career, one thing is evident. In the classic sense, he won’t be “sloppy,” “hungry,” or “composed,” as Pietersen desires. It doesn’t seem to be his style. He places himself in unusual situations as a batsman that even former cricket players find confusing, not to mention the fans.

Before left-arm spinner Tom Hartley released the ball and went back to his starting position to tap away the balls, he began to shuffle his outside leg in Visakhapatnam. That also infuriated Pietersen. How come you’re acting that way on this wicket? As a batter, what you are doing is making things worse for yourself by losing sight of your weaknesses.

Pietersen may have been irritated by Iyer’s reputation as an excellent attacking batsman of spin because of his sparkling feet, daring, inventiveness, and ability to pull it off, but this series hasn’t seen much of it. However, we have previously witnessed that shuffle move in the subcontinent, usually in white-ball cricket.

Salim Malik of Pakistan would destroy spinners, but instead of running back to the crease, he would stay there and cut, slice, and slash through the off side. Iyer seems to set himself off on a dare, but he doesn’t quite go all in. As Pietersen had requested, he approached the bowler in the second innings. He attempted a powerful heave against the turn, but miscued it to long off.

Or consider the stance he took when the short-pitched stuff started against James Anderson on a track that was rather quiet. He was taking them down for a little while when all of a sudden he pulled to a previous tactic. Attempting to swat balls over the off side, move outside the leg stump. He made no connection with anyone; at one point, he was almost pulled onto his stumps, which made Ollie Pope and the others smile.

Remarkably, Don Bradman employed the same strategy in the renowned Bodyline series. Bradman had had enough of trying to keep the ball down or sway away when the field behind was square on the leg packed (the rules would later be changed to not more than two men) and Larwood and Co. opened the dam of bouncers. He moved to the outside leg and attempted to slash them to the off side because all he had to face were short balls and he wanted runs. He even pulled a ball onto his stumps at one point. The cricketing world was split over this intriguing approach. While some, including his own teammate Jack Fingleton, believed it to be the legendary batsman going “yellow,” others thought it was a smart move to score some runs in opposition to that attack.

James Anderson, a swing legend who has reinvented himself with seam bowling in the subcontinent, was playing on a flat track in Visakhapatnam. Anderson, 41, isn’t known for bowling pacy, high-intense bouncers. Furthermore, England’s starting XI contained no other medium pacer—forget paceman—at all. But Iyer prefers to bat like that. He is reluctant to waver or retreat for an unknown reason. There’s also no assurance that he can maintain the ball down on the leg side where English palms are waiting close to the boundary.

It’s not like he hasn’t recently employed traditional methods. He adjusted with his bat-lift, as Mohammad Kaif would note on Star Sports during the World Cup. Previously, he held the bat behind him, not quite parallel to the ground but not extremely up, instead of holding it almost vertically up in his stance and tilting it further past the ears before the downswing began. The entire swing had tightened and smoothed out.

He had stated, “I definitely won’t have a problem if I can leave or keep it down,” but Iyer is obviously not interested in doing so. Does he think it’s not cool, that it won’t inspire more bouncers, or that it’s not how aggressively he wants to see himself bat? However, none of his available options will prevent pacers—even a medium pacer with over forty years of experience—from trying the shorter stuff.

Success would be the deciding factor in the end, whether going the conventional or unique route. The critics may stop talking if he retreats and scores fours on the untenanted off side. The opposition’s fast bowlers and spinners will keep spinning away at him until then, so forget about them. At all costs, he needs to make Rajkot count.