'The batting let them down again' - Ajit Agarkar expresses disappointment after India's consecutive defeats

India faced a dismaying defeat against New Zealand in their second fixture of the T20 World Cup 2021. The former India cricketer and commentator Ajit Agarkar expressed his disappointment at the team for their performances against the Kiwis. India entered the contest against the Kane Williamson-led side in what was a crucial encounter for both sides.

India’s batting unit struggled in their opening fixture against Pakistan. The scripts quite did not change this time around as well. No batter was able to provide enough resistance and at the end, a quick cameo by Jadeja helped the side to put a target of 111 runs. Agarkar thus feels the team’s batting has let them down yet again.

“It’s a bad defeat and it’s a bad performance. You can have tough days on a cricket field, every cricketer has had that. You can lose games but it’s sometimes the way you lose the games. The batting let India down again. It did in the last game and you can put that to some exceptional bowling from Pakistan upfront but today even though New Zealand bowlers were good, India at the moment are not finding answers to perhaps sometimes the form, sometimes the nerves,” Agarkar said while speaking on ESPNcricinfo’s show T20 Time Out.

The change at the top today was surprising to me: Ajit Agarkar

India made two changes in the game against the Black Caps. Ishan Kishan replaced Suryakumar Yadav and Shardul Thakur came in place of Bhuvneshwar Kumar. KL Rahul and Kishan opened the innings and this surprised the former cricketer. Agarkar also added that team India isn’t playing to their best potential in the tournament.

“You don’t see this quite often because this is an accomplished team. The change at the top today was surprising to me, good teams don’t do that especially after a loss and India have done that and it has not worked for them. It is one of the worst batting performances of recent times because this is still a very good Indian team. Unfortunately, they are not playing like one,” Agarkar added.