
Boria Majumdar in Manchester
Whoever decided to hand Anshul Kamboj a Test debut has done the young man a disservice. It turned out to be a poor call for India and might end up scarring the bowler forever. Truth be told, he isn’t ready for this stage. He doesn’t look the part and is fish out of water. He could well be jet lagged. And also unfit. Someone who bowls at an average of 125 kmph cannot be a new-ball bowler at this level and his inclusion has completely destroyed the balance of India’s bowling attack.
Look at him and you know something is wrong. His body language shows he isn’t enjoying it. He is running in, but that’s where it ends. Joe Root and Ben Stokes were literally walking into him and hitting at will. At one point, Root was standing a foot outside and taking a couple of steps down to every ball. And in all this, Dhruv Jurel, for reasons beyond comprehension, was standing way behind the stumps.
Kamboj reminded me of Pankaj Singh in 2014. Sadly, he never played Test cricket for India again. It also reminded me of RP Singh being called up to join the team in 2011, when he had no connect with cricket and was on a holiday. His first ball was a huge wide bowled at a pace of 78mph.
Not one over to Washington Sundar! Is he playing as a batter at number 8?
Jurel- when a bowler is bowling at 125kmph why does it take 3 overs to come up to the stumps?
Kamboj- 125-128 kmph- can it ever work at this level?
Worst bowling and fielding effort this series.
— Boria Majumdar (@BoriaMajumdar) July 25, 2025
Kamboj, in what was a series decider, was as bad a call as one could possibly take. And thereafter, you note that a Kuldeep Yadav is cooling his heels. Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Siraj and Shardul Thakur with Kuldeep could have been a much better attack, but for whatever reason, the team management preferred Kamboj. The cal has hurt India huge.
The post-lunch period summed up what it was like for Kamboj with the second new ball. Bumrah had gone off and India were compelled to go to Kamboj. With Shubman Gill too having left the field for a bio break, no one was seen speaking to the young bowler. Kamboj looked lost and so did India.
This Test match, for all practical purposes, is gone. Unless India bat out of their skins, there is only one winner here on. It will mean another series loss and pose serious questions for Gautam Gambhir and Morne Morkel. In the last one year, India have won nothing in this format and the ledger looks horrible. No bowler has been unearthed and those who had looked decent a year earlier, like Mukesh Kumar, aren’t in the scheme of things at the moment.
Ahead of the final Test at the Oval, India seem to have gone back to 2014 — listless, unimaginative and a body language that is defeatist. The Kamboj call-up sums it up and shows that all that could go wrong has indeed gone wrong in Manchester. All that Gill & Co can do now is make a statement with the bat.
Footnote: A certain Rishabh Pant has refused to wear the cast just in case he can make a contribution. You feel sad for him. You really do.
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