Fight it out: Tendulkar to India ahead of Boxing Day test

NEW DELHI: The only way out for the Indian cricketers to overcome the crushing defeat to Australia in the first Test is to "fight it out" and do "something magnificent" in the remaining three matches that would change negative thinking, cricket icon Sachin Tendulkar has said in an exclusive interview with IANS.

Failure of top-order batsmen was largely responsible for India's eight-wicket mauling in Adelaide, but Tendulkar, 47, doesn't feel that it was due to pressure on the players. The batting maestro, who aggregated 34,357 runs and 100 centuries in international cricket, says it were technical flaws that impacted the top-order batsmen. He, particularly, noticed one big shortcoming in most frontline batsmen — absence of a solid forward defence, a technical flaw that became more pronounced by the lack of a big stride forward.

Also, Tendulkar points out that it would have been better if India would have started the tour with the T20I series, then played the ODIs, and finally the Test series — with the last match being with the pink ball. That would have been an ideal transition from white ball to red ball to pink ball.

But India began the Test series with a pink ball day-night encounter, which Virat Kohli's team India lost by eight wickets, and now trail 0-1. But there are three more matches to go in the series for India to stage a comeback and retain the Border-Gavaskar Trophy. In 2018-19, India had won the previous series 2-1 — their first ever on Australian soil. (IANS)

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