Indian opener Gautam Gambhir felt that a score in the region of 350 would be challenging in conditions that is helping the pacers.
“When you bat first after winning the toss, you look to push the score beyond 300 to make it challenging. Now we have a decent score on the board and should look to push it a bit tomorrow,” Gambhir said at the end of the first day’s play in the third Test against England, on Wednesday.
“We lost two wickets more in the end. Wish MS (Dhoni) and (Ravichandran) Ashwin could have continued till the stumps,” Gambhir said.
The player was sore about the way his opening partner Virender Sehwag was run out following a mix-up between the two.
“At that the moment I did not think that there was a third run, as I was watching the ball. But after seeing the replay I thought there was one,” Gambhir said.
Disappointed
“When such dismissals happen it plays on your mind. The situation could have been different otherwise as the partnership was looking headed for a long way. We could have given a start from where the team could have dominated. I am disappointed for the team,”
When asked about the impact of Sachin Tendulkar’s dismissal on the team’s prospects, Gambhir said one has to look at the final score to assess it. “It is the collective effort that matters not the individual scores. Every run we put on the board does matter for the Indian team, which is more significant,” Gambhir said.
Praise for Anderson
The Indian opener praised James Anderson for his disciplined bowling and said the Englishman’s success holds the key for the Indian pacers — Zaheer Khan and Ishant Sharma. “He (Anderson) bowled well, especially, the way he hid the shine and produced the reverse swing later in the day. We have Zaheer and Ishant who can do the same thing and that is the encouraging part for us,” Gambhir said.
Anderson, who was the pick of English bowlers, acknowledged that the art of deception — that of effectively hiding the shine before delivering — was something he picked up from the Indian pacer Zaheer Khan.
“The last time when we toured India (2008) I saw Zaheer doing it for effective reverse swing and I have been practising that since then,” he said.
The England pacer, who picked up three wickets for 68 runs, said the wicket of Sachin Tendulkar was most important. “Sachin’s wicket was a big one. He is such a class player and could have got a big hundred,” he said.
