Jadeja batted with the tail in India’s 193 chase. While the team was struggling at 112 for 8, Jadeja formed vital partnerships with Jasprit Bumrah and Mohammed Siraj. Both bowlers were dismissed, but Jadeja remained unbroken as India lost by 22 runs.
Former Indian cricketer Balwinder Singh Sandhu said Ravindra Jadeja clever and calm under pressure. Sandhu claimed that this time Jadeja may have faced fear of failure and pressure from relying on the tail-enders, which may have damaged his playing.
As the last seconds approach, Ravindra Jadeja is someone I’ve known from his U-19 National Cricket Academy days. He demonstrated maturity beyond his age then. “He’s a smart cricketer, calm under pressure, but this time, maybe the fear of failing or not trusting the tail got the better of him,” Sandhu wrote in Mid-Day.
“He should have trusted Jasprit Bumrah more, especially when he was defending so well, and resisted taking that single off the fourth ball to retain strike.
He said if he had backed himself to finish it in those last two balls with the field up, it would have been brilliant to go for the boundary.
Indian Test legend Cheteshwar Pujara noted that the pitch was sluggish, making it hard for Jadeja to score rapidly. He said scoring runs on such a pitch, especially on Day 5, was difficult.
He couldn’t have scored faster on that track. I thought it was the soft ball and slow pitch. Jadeja probably thought the tailenders were batting well and the squad was near to the total. As they got closer, he would have taken his chances. I liked his batting. That pitch made scoring runs difficult, said Pujara.
His only improvement would have been to score down the ground. As if mid-off and cover were separated, he concluded.
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