'Challenges for Team India on UK tour'

Have no pressure on me. I just want to take Indian cricket forward, says Kohli

(Image TOI: James Anderson of England and Virat Kohli of India during 2nd Test, 2014)

Nishant Poonia, New Delhi | 04 September, 2021

After the departure of the Indian team from Mumbai to London for a long english summer last night, starts talks about the tour and the challenges, Team India is scheduled to play six test matches in England on this tour, firstly Virat Kohli and his mens going to take on New Zealand in ICC World Test Championship Final 2021 in Southampton on 18th June then after a gap of one long month Indian team will play 5 test match-series against the hosts England.

Challenges

 We all have seen in the past that Indian batsmen always struggled in England because of seam and swinging conditions, they are also not going to play any practice game before the series and this makes it more harder for them to perform, against the likes of James Anderson and Stuart Board, In the last series in 2018 Virat Kohli was the lone man standing for India apart from him all other batsmen struggled, and now this series is going to be very tough for the Indians.

Pre-tour press conference

According to TOI, Just before leaving for the UK, Captain Virat Kohli and Head coach Ravi Shastri faced the press and expressed their thoughts and their mindset just before the tour starts, Kohli was asked about what's the pressure on playing the WTC Final against New Zealand? Captain said "Have no pressure on me. I just want to take Indian cricket forward. There was no pressure on me previously and nor is there any sort of pressure on me now."

Later on replying to another question he added "Conditions are as potent for New Zealand as they are for us. Conditions in Australia should've favoured them too. It's about how you look at things. If you want us to think that NZ will have an advantage before boarding the flight, then it's that otherwise we feel we are equal," said Kohli. 

India's record in England

Indian team finds a bit hard to get results in England, since 2007 series win in England India didn't perform well, neither they won, In 2011 India lost Test series 5-0 under the captaincy of MS Dhoni with all experienced players, In 2014 again MS Dhoni's led India lost there 3-1, In 2018 Young Indian Captain Virat Kohli led India but results seems to be same as they were in the past, India lost there 4-1, these score lines suggests how bad India played in the UK over the years, but surely this time we are going to see some different results because of this fearless team and their performances in last two or three years.