ENG vs IND 2025: ‘You can’t come out arrogant’ – Dinesh Karthik lambasts England’s batting plan after early collapse on Day 2 of Edgbaston Test

Dinesh Karthik, a former India wicketkeeper-batsman, chastised England’s batsmen for playing too aggressively, failing to consider the conditions or the quality of the opposing spinners.

After Ben Stokes won the toss and chose to bowl first in the second Test at Edgbaston, Birmingham, the Indian batters put the England bowlers to the test, scoring 587 runs in 151 overs, led by Shubman Gill’s epic 269-run knock, with excellent support from Yashasvi Jaiswal and Ravindra Jadeja.

England got to bat in the closing session of Day 2, and they didn’t appear to be up to the task. The Three Lions lost three wickets in 20 overs and scored only 77 runs.

“Certainly, you must put it on worn legs, but also on tired thoughts. Test cricket tests your mental strength; it will not be easy every time. You elected to bowl first, and you ended up bowling 150 overs, and now as a batting team, you need to come out and say, ‘Alright, here we go, today, we might need to play till the day’s play and then work out how we want to play tomorrow,'” Karthik said.

Dinesh Karthik believed that the England batters acted arrogantly while batting.

The cricketer-turned-expert believed England had learnt to temper their ultra-aggressive Bazball tactics, but this was not evident on Thursday, July 3.

“You can’t come out arrogant and say, ‘Okay, I’m going to play like it’s the first of the day.'” It does not operate that way. Sometimes you have to buckle down, and I believe that is where Bazball has improved, but today we had a glimmer of what we’ve seen before,” he said.

Mohammed Siraj creates trouble at the start of Day 3.

England already had an uphill battle on Day 3 as they trailed India’s first-innings score by 510 runs. They needed their greatest batter, Joe Root, to step up and help them out of a bad predicament. However, Mohammed Siraj dismissed the right-handed hitter with the first ball he bowled to him on Day 3. Root attempted to flick a delivery on leg-stump, but only managed a weak nick to wicketkeeper Rishabh Pant.

Stokes stepped out to replace Root in the middle, but the England captain only stayed for one ball. Siraj bowled an excellent short delivery, causing the southpaw to tangle. The edge went clean through to Pant, and Siraj took two wickets in as many deliveries. England has lost half of their team with only 84 runs on the board and will require a miracle to save this Test match.