Generally, a ploy that a lot of overseas batsmen use against the subcontinent spinners is to try and sweep them as much as they can, so that the spinners can’t land the bowl on a length and the England batsmen tried to do the same to the Indian leggie, Yuzvendra Chahal, in the second ODI at Lord’s.
However, as it turned out, England lost as many as 4 wickets in the process of playing the sweep shots. The 4th wicket was a slog sweep which was played by Moeen Ali more in the desperation of scoring some quick runs, rather than anything else, but the first three wickets were the case of Chahal completely out skilling the England batsmen.
The England opener Jonny Bairstow, who is one of the hardest hitters of the ball in world cricket at the moment, was well set when Yuzvendra Chahal came on to bowl in the Lord’s ODI. Just as Chahal came on, Jonny went for a big sweep looking to hit the ball over deep midwicket, but he ended up getting completely outfoxed by the flight of the ball and was clean bowled.
Joe Root and Ben Stokes got out LBW while trying to sweep Yuzvendra Chahal
Joe Root was done in by the flight as well, although he was not quite looking to play a lofted sweep and was looking to play the ball along the ground, but he was still going across the line and was beaten by the dip of the ball. The England test captain Ben Stokes then tried to reverse sweep Chahal and after scoring a couple of boundaries, he was also trapped in front of the stumps.
Yuzvendra Chahal spoke about his spell on bcci. tv after the game finished and he said that he doesn’t mind the batsman trying to sweep him or reverse sweep him because he knows they are doing so to make him change his length, but rather than getting defensive and looking to escape from the batsman’s sweep shot, he looks to get the batsman out.
