Clive Lloyd surprised with Virat Kohli's decision to bowl first in the final

Well, not many would’ve been critical of India’s decision to bowl first in the Champions Trophy final at that point of time. But it doesn’t seem like everyone is happy with Virat Kohli’s decision a couple of days after the match, for obvious reasons that India lost the game. West Indian legend and two-time World Cup winning captain Clive Lloyd is the latest addition to this list of people who were baffled by Kohli’s decision to put Pakistan into bat first.

Indian bowlers were really put to bed by the Pakistani batsmen, who kept scoring at a brisk pace. Fakhar Zaman’s ton and half centuries from Azhar Ali and Mohammad Hafeez propelled Pakistan to a mammoth total of 338 runs. With Mohammad Amir dismissing the Indian top 3 in no time, Pakistan ruthlessly pounded on the Indians and won the game by 180 runs.

Conditions suited the batsmen

“Look, I am not being smart after the event, but here, the conditions suited the batsmen and the Indian side have quality batsmen,” Lloyd was quoted as saying. But the Indian contingent have been chasing well over the course of the tournament, which prompted Kohli to put them into bat.

Clive Lloyd is arguably the best person to take a suggestion from when it comes to such high voltage finals. He himself led West Indies to two World Cup glories in 1975 and 1979 and to date the team under Clive Lloyd is rated as the greatest team of all time.

Bumrah should sort his problems in the nets

When Jasprit Bumrah got the better of Fakhar Zaman in a crucial stage of the game, TV replays showed that the pacer had overstepped and Zaman just lashed out hard after that. Bumrah had a disastrous outing on Sunday as he bowled 3 no balls and 5 wides, which is something you don’t want from your premium death overs bowler.

Lloyd suggested that he should work a lot more in the nets to get his accuracy back in check. “He needs to be taken to the nets and sorted out,” he said. When the legend was asked about the kind of problems his fast bowlers like Malcolm Marshall, Joel Garner or Michael Holding used to face and they dealt with it, he said they were true professionals who never needed any assistance from anyone to get things sorted.

“They were true professionals. When there was a problem, it used to be sorted out immediately and remember we didn’t have coaches and footage in those days,” said a very proud Lloyd.