Virat Kohli's Boys Have Barely Lasted 7 Days Across 2 Tests Vs New Zealand. It's A Bad Sign As This Was A Dress Rehearsal For The Australian Tour

Before the Test series between India and New Zealand took place, if anyone told us Virat Kohli's boys would be crushed 2-0, we would have laughed them in the face. Well after it is done and dusted, it's Team India that is the laughing stock, but it is hardly a laughing matter. Kohli's boys hardly lasted 7 days in a total of 2 Tests combined. The first game was lost by 10 wickets inside 4 days. As if to prove that they could get worse, they went down by 7 wickets in 3 days in the next game. The series surrendered, the rubber gone and now Kohli knows how it feels to be whitewashed in a Test series as skipper.

But there is a more worrying sign in the months to come. Why is that? Because in late 2020 we are going to Australia, conditions not too different from New Zealand and most importantly a team more strong than the Kiwis. The just-concluded series was supposed to be a dress rehearsal for the tour to Australia and if our performance is anything to go by, then the series Down Under is doomed to be a disaster.

So where did we go wrong and what do we need to do to ensure a repeat does not happen? Yes, we won our maiden Test series in Australia just over a year back, but let's be honest, the current Aussie team is more deadly than the one we had defeated. There are several factors that need to be looked at.

One cause for concern is Kohli's form. He did not make a substantial score and was making errors which he usually would not to be sent back early. It shows he is human and maybe in going through a bad patch. Of course the man is just an innings away from a big score, but he needs to get back into the groove by the time we land in Australia.

Our batting in general needs to regroup. Openers Mayank Agarwal and Prithvi Shaw did well in patches but never converted their starts into big scores. The same goes for the likes of Cheteshwar Pujara and Ajinkya Rahane. We scored 165, 194, 242 and 124 in the 4 innings. The fact that we did not pass 250 even once and failed to score 200 on three occasions is hard to believe when one considers we have one of the best batting line-ups in the world.

While the bowlers have done an excellent job in general, they have been slacking when putting the Kiwis under pressure. In the first Test, India had the chance to go for the kill but the tail wagged allowing them a huge lead.

The sad part is we did not learn from our mistakes in the first Test and committed them once again in the second match. For a side that had won the last 7 Tests, been unbeaten in the last 9, this was nothing short of a horror show.

But all hope is not lost. There is time to recover, address the issues, find the remedies. There is plenty of cricket to be played before we go Down Under. By the time we do, we should be a fresh bunch no longer scarred by New Zealand. In 2011 we sank in England and the impact made us sink in Australia too. The same thing happened in 2014 and then in 2018 we flopped in South Africa and it impacted our performance in England. But it was in Australia that we found redemption. There is no reason why we cannot do that again.