Pietersen wants England to admit their batting was dreadful, cites Rohit Sharma's example

Days after complaining against Indian pitches amid the ongoing Test series between India and England, former cricketer Kevin Pietersen on Friday admitted that the visitors had failed with the bat. Pietersen, who along with Michael Vaughan, has been criticising pitches in India since Kohli & Co. won the second Test at the Chepauk, now tweeted that he hopes the English players 'acknowledge' that their batting was 'dreadful' at the Narendra Modi Stadium in the third Test of the series. 

Citing Indian skipper Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma's admission, the former England batsman asked Root & Co. to follow the same. Pietersen was referring to the post-match presentation and the conference addressed by the Indian batsmen in which they admitted that the batting unit failed to apply technique in the third Test as they addressed the issue of the low-scoring game. 

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Even after the match ended on Thursday on Day 2 itself, Pietersen had admitted that the wicket was not 'horrendous' but the batting from both the teams was 'awful'. The English cricketer-turned-commentator highlighted that 21 off the 30 wickets that fell in the third Test were victims of straight balls and nothing dangerous. 

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England out of WTC race

As Team India steamrolled over England in the third Test of the series, Kohli's men also crushed Root & Co's hopes of qualifying for the World Test Championship finale at the Lord's with the 10 wicket win on Thursday. India's spin masters Ravichandran Ashwin and Axar Patel wreaked havoc in Ahmedabad as they dismissed England for merely 81 runs in the second innings eyeing to finish the proceedings within 2 days of the Test. Chasing a paltry total of 49, the Indian batsmen never looked uncomfortable as they made easy work of this small run chase as openers Rohit Sharma, and, Shubman Gill counter-attacked the English spinners with their aggressive batting display as the hosts comfortably got past the finish line by 10 wickets.

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Now India needs to either win or draw the final Test of the series against England to book the finale berth at Lord's against New Zealand. If India loses the fourth match, Australia will qualify for the final of the World Test Championship in June later this year. Meanwhile, Team India have also registered their second Day-Night Test victory after their heroics in Ahmedabad. Prior to this contest, they had won their first pink-ball Test against Bangladesh at the iconic Eden Gardens, Kolkata in November 2019 and suffered an eight-wicket defeat at the hands of Australia at the Adelaide Oval in December 2020 where the Indian team also ended up registering their lowest-ever Test score of 36. 

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