Test Cricket Prediction and Discussion Thread [self - mod]

[Haunebu]

It's crazy to think that India finally lost a test series at home after 4330 days while Pakistan finally won a test series at home after 1355 days literally on the same day. What a crazy coincidence.

Anyway, I miss the Kohli-Shastri era where India dominated the test format for a long, long time. Gambhir as the head coach is overrated.

[noormcs5]

Pakistan won the second game too and Saud Shakeel was named as the player of the game but I think Sajid Khan deserves to be the player of the match as compared to Saud Shakeel because Sajid Khan did wonderful bowling and helped Pakistan through the victory.

Saud Shakeel made 134 runs but also at the same time, Sajid Khan did good batting too, he made 72 runs but the thing that explains he should be the player of the game on his all around performance, he was hit by a hard bouncer even his shirt was filled with blood in some parts but still, he was playing and I don't know but I have listened that he has stitches but was still playing, maybe I am wrong in this but I have listened to it on social media.

You are right in your point of view but at the same time, if you analyze in the first innings, Pakistan were losing their wickets back to back and no one stable the game then Saud Shakeel came who played wonderful innings and completed his century and that was the main cause by which the the Pakistan team came out from the pressure and then the next players also started to play with him and started making partnership with him. Sajid Khan also scored well and picked wickets in a good way. In short, both could be the player of the match from different point of view but yup Saud Shakeel got the title. 

[sarmrakib]

Pakistan won the second game too and Saud Shakeel was named as the player of the game but I think Sajid Khan deserves to be the player of the match as compared to Saud Shakeel because Sajid Khan did wonderful bowling and helped Pakistan through the victory.

Saud Shakeel made 134 runs but also at the same time, Sajid Khan did good batting too, he made 72 runs but the thing that explains he should be the player of the game on his all around performance, he was hit by a hard bouncer even his shirt was filled with blood in some parts but still, he was playing and I don't know but I have listened that he has stitches but was still playing, maybe I am wrong in this but I have listened to it on social media.

You are right in your point of view but at the same time, if you analyze in the first innings, Pakistan were losing their wickets back to back and no one stable the game then Saud Shakeel came who played wonderful innings and completed his century and that was the main cause by which the the Pakistan team came out from the pressure and then the next players also started to play with him and started making partnership with him. Sajid Khan also scored well and picked wickets in a good way. In short, both could be the player of the match from different point of view but yup Saud Shakeel got the title.  

After a long time Pakistan has won a test match on their own ground. However though the wickets of Pakistan behaving unusual still Shakeel really played well and then the other. However Sajid really bowled well made easy to win the match. To play match on Asia continent is always challenging and England really played well against Pakistan. Hopefully Pakistan have some confidence now after series beaten against Bangladesh. Now they are looking more strong for the future.

[noormcs5]

After a long time Pakistan has won a test match on their own ground. However though the wickets of Pakistan behaving unusual still Shakeel really played well and then the other. However Sajid really bowled well made easy to win the match. To play match on Asia continent is always challenging and England really played well against Pakistan. Hopefully Pakistan have some confidence now after series beaten against Bangladesh. Now they are looking more strong for the future.

Sajid Khan always performed well in every single game since he came in cricket but always dropped without any specific reason, not on performance based but for some political reasons ( my guess).

As recently at the start of 2024, Pakistan was in a tour of Australia and he performed very well there after that, he was dropped for the next series and like this once again he was selected for this series but again dropped for the first game for no reason but when he picked for the second game, I think he will never be drop ever again and also according to the sources, he will be selected for the Champions Trophy 2025.

[JSRAW]

Update
- As of now, India are in a comfortable position but they shouldn't be complacent in the next home series against the Kiwis and look to strengthen their position. Last time they ran away with 1 draw test (because of bad light) when they were 9 down.

- Australia needs to win BGT against India, otherwise, they are in a tough situation because they have an away tour against SL and the Lankans are in some form.

- SL should do alright against Australia at home but they need to channel all their energy towards Proteas in an away series. They successfully won against SA in 2019 so one could hope for a tight competition.

- Proteas could be worthy candidates for the finals if they win against Bangbros in an away series. After that, they are playing 2 home series against SL and PAK.

WTC table update

- Some drastic changes for India and now they need to win 4 matches in the next 6 fixtures. 5 are against Australia, The WTC final seems like a dream now. 
- No changes for Australia
- South Africa is in alright position atm because they won 1 match against Bangladesh.
- Kiwis has entered the WTC final race, given they win their next 4 matches (1 against India + 3 matches at home against England)

And it's going strong and it should continue, unless the Kiwis surprise everyone. If I am not wrong then Windies and South Africa will also travel here in 2025.

Indian fans should enjoy it while it lasts because such streaks are meant to be broken. I would guess that once Ash-Jaddu takes retirement or some freaky fightback from any touring team (both are obvious guesses tho, no rocket science). I'd be a happy person if we cross the 20-21 mark, saying it because Aussie got 2 good runs and we should at least double it, anything above is a bonus.

Finally, it ended! Truly the best 8-10 years of Indian test cricket. 

Big shout out to the Kiwis, it's their first test series win in India. They outplayed India in every department convincingly.

[sarmrakib]

After a long time Pakistan has won a test match on their own ground. However though the wickets of Pakistan behaving unusual still Shakeel really played well and then the other. However Sajid really bowled well made easy to win the match. To play match on Asia continent is always challenging and England really played well against Pakistan. Hopefully Pakistan have some confidence now after series beaten against Bangladesh. Now they are looking more strong for the future.

Sajid Khan always performed well in every single game since he came in cricket but always dropped without any specific reason, not on performance based but for some political reasons ( my guess).

As recently at the start of 2024, Pakistan was in a tour of Australia and he performed very well there after that, he was dropped for the next series and like this once again he was selected for this series but again dropped for the first game for no reason but when he picked for the second game, I think he will never be drop ever again and also according to the sources, he will be selected for the Champions Trophy 2025.

Surely he is a great bowler and really did bowl well. I didn’t  actually noticed his performance against Australia. I have seen him on England series and i am really amazed with his bowling. Nice and different action of bowling. I don’t have any reason to not select him for any series and even for champions trophy. Pakistan selectors need to more watchful before making their team for any international trophy. They should need to select such a wonderful player in every series if he available the result might be on Pakistan side.

[libert19]

~

Indians were complacent for some reason hence this loss — poor shot selection and poor fielding, and btw I was one of those who were taking India in wtc final for granted but now BGT will be more interesting I suppose.

Regarding, Ash-Jadeja, don't you think Washington-Axar will be able to fill in the shoes?

Edit: India's squad for BGT announced: https://www.bcci.tv/bccilink/articles/N8QHV8Sz

I am pleased to see Abhimanyu Easwaran, and NK Reddy.

[Haunebu]

WTC table update

- Some drastic changes for India and now they need to win 4 matches in the next 6 fixtures. 5 are against Australia, The WTC final seems like a dream now. 
- No changes for Australia
- South Africa is in alright position atm because they won 1 match against Bangladesh.
- Kiwis has entered the WTC final race, given they win their next 4 matches (1 against India + 3 matches at home against England)

I was pretty confident that India and Australia would end up in the WTC final sometime back, but I am not confident anymore about India at the very least. Australia will most probably secure their spot in the final.

New Zealand and South Africa possess better chances when compared to India now. New Zealand is on a crazy high these days(T20 World Cup and defeating India on their turf) which is why they could take up the other final spot.

[Fuso.hp]

Disappointing dismissals of Pant and Kohli, both balls deserved to go to boundary. Indian fielders looked complacent in field. India lost the first game, they must win this match to level the series, I don't get why they are playing like this.

I still believe KL Rahul would have been appropriate in the place of Sarfaraz.

I mean no one sane would have picked pick KL over Sarfaraz considering Sarfaraz made 150 in first test match, and KL is having a bad run at the moment — fail at home stadium in two consecutive innings, that's bad.

Yashasvi Jaiswal's early T20 style batting seemed to give India a good start in the innings, but when the batting disaster happened later, India's confidence started to fade away. Now maybe it is not possible to win but it would be better if some miracle can be done to draw the match. Only time will tell if India can draw the match with Mitchell Santner's bowling spin.  Now that Sarfraz Khan and Washington Sundhor are on wicket, a huge responsibility has fallen on them. Rishabh Pant collected a total of 18 runs in 2 innings i.e. scored a golden duck in the second innings. India didn't expect anything like this from Risab Pant.

New Zealand managed to set a big target against India due to which India tried to bat in ODI style from the start of the second innings today but India failed there. In the second innings, India lost all wickets and managed to put the scoreboard on 245 runs as New Zealand secured an easy 113-run victory over India. Team India fell far behind in the fight to reach the final of the World Test Championship due to the loss of 2 consecutive matches against New Zealand. The next matches when India will perform as a touring team, it will be more difficult for them to win those matches especially in England and Australian conditions. 

Against India, New Zealand definitely proved to be the best performer by defeating India in two matches at their home ground.

[Bitcoin_people]

The New Zealand team won the second test match by 113 runs, congratulations to the New Zealand team, they played brilliantly on Indian soil. But the Indian team must express a lot of regret here that they could not show this performance against New Zealand with the performance they have played in the previous matches. As a result of the series, New Zealand already won the series by two matches, but it must be a pity for India that they lost at their home ground. However, the New Zealand team batted well from the start and their bowling lines were excellent, due to which they managed to keep India under control. Man of the match was adjudged today by Mitchell Santner who had a brilliant bowling performance picking up 6 wickets. But anyway I say India must take good decisions for the next match, and try to win even if it's a series match or else they will be a whitewash of the Test series.

[ImThour]

What a brilliant showing from New Zealand against India in this Test series. Made me wonder why they aren't producing results like these in T20 or ODI formats and are still rocking pretty solid in Test Cricket, maybe others team have adopted the fast pace of cricket much better than them and they are still stuck with their ideology? Could be anything but this series win from them against a team like India is amazing.

Nice try from Washington though.

[JSRAW]

~

Regarding, Ash-Jadeja, don't you think Washington-Axar will be able to fill in the shoes?

As a pure bowler? Nope. Axar has some chance of replacing Jaddu but I don't think any bowler can replace Ashwin. People have weak memory and they forget how many series this guy has won for India.

Yes, both Axar and Washi have tasted a bit of success with the ball but the sample size is small so the Jury is still out. As far as batting is concerned, they are deserving candidates if they are batting down the order like the 6th,7th and 8th numbers and both of them are superior to Jaddu-Ashwin (batting).

Even in overseas, they should be okay as they have good defense and technique. Washi did show a glimpse of his talent in Australia, his fitness would be a challenge tho as he has a habit of getting injured all the time. Axar won't get a chance to play overseas, as long as Jadeja is there.

Edit: India's squad for BGT announced: https://www.bcci.tv/bccilink/articles/N8QHV8Sz

I am pleased to see Abhimanyu Easwaran, and NK Reddy.

I was rooting for NKR, Harshit Rana and Abhimanyu. All of them did good in Irani Cup.

Is anyone watching Irani Cup?

Abhimanyu Easwaran needs a good PR team.

WTC table update

- Some drastic changes for India and now they need to win 4 matches in the next 6 fixtures. 5 are against Australia, The WTC final seems like a dream now. 
- No changes for Australia
- South Africa is in alright position atm because they won 1 match against Bangladesh.
- Kiwis has entered the WTC final race, given they win their next 4 matches (1 against India + 3 matches at home against England)

I was pretty confident that India and Australia would end up in the WTC final sometime back, but I am not confident anymore about India at the very least. Australia will most probably secure their spot in the final.

New Zealand and South Africa possess better chances when compared to India now. New Zealand is on a crazy high these days(T20 World Cup and defeating India on their turf) which is why they could take up the other final spot.

Not just you but everyone and not to mention SL whitewashed Kiwis recently and now the same Kiwis will try to whitewash India.

[Rustam Meraj]

Excellent performance by Pakistani team especially their bowlers. And in bowlers their are two names which are shining at this time and their names are Sajid Khan and Nouman Ali. In the first innings Sajid Khan collected 6 wickets and Nouman Ali collected 3 wickets and in the second innings Sajid Khan collected to 4 wickets and Nouman Ali collected 6 wickets. Means these two players destroyed the England team and due to them Pakistan was able to win this match. Excellent played Pakistan. I hope they will continue this performance in the future too.

[tsaroz]

What a brilliant showing from New Zealand against India in this Test series. Made me wonder why they aren't producing results like these in T20 or ODI formats and are still rocking pretty solid in Test Cricket, maybe others team have adopted the fast pace of cricket much better than them and they are still stuck with their ideology? Could be anything but this series win from them against a team like India is amazing.

Nice try from Washington though.

Could also be the team form. India was doing much better in ODIs than they have done on this test series. This is a full Indian team and had hoped their second innings be as good as the 2nd innings in the 1st test but the 2nd innings for both the teams turned out to be the low scoring one. But even at such crease, New Zealand performed better and won the series before a match being played.
It would be one of the worst series India had in home ground for decades. They need to win the last test to save themselves from being white washed. After the series India is going to South Africa for T20s, that would test the teams overall performance.

[ITExpert]

Excellent performance by Pakistani team especially their bowlers. And in bowlers their are two names which are shining at this time and their names are Sajid Khan and Nouman Ali. In the first innings Sajid Khan collected 6 wickets and Nouman Ali collected 3 wickets and in the second innings Sajid Khan collected to 4 wickets and Nouman Ali collected 6 wickets. Means these two players destroyed the England team and due to them Pakistan was able to win this match. Excellent played Pakistan. I hope they will continue this performance in the future too.

I think behind this performance of Pakistan, there is a lot of effort of a legend team management Aqib Javed. Aqib Javed was the one who included such brilliant spin talented player's Naman Ali and Sajid Khan in the team and Aqib Javed had said that I see how the England team wins on the spin created pitches in Pakistan and the formula has been proven perfectly Pakistan took home advantage very much. In the first match, England scored 800 plus and lost only seven wickets, but In the second and third Test match, he giving 40 wickets for only 814 runs. now It is interesting to see how these two spinners Sajid and Naman Ali perform in next test series.

[Farhan99]

If India can meet the target of 359 runs today, then they will win this match today. Moreover, if India does not win this match today then they will definitely lose the series and New Zealand team will win the series. We have seen that New Zealand team won the first match in a great way, and they still have the highest chances to win the second test match as well. On the third day, India scored 184 runs and lost 7 wickets. Indian team batsmen are batting under a lot of pressure at the moment. I think they will be all out very soon. India still needs to collect 175 runs to win, moreover they don't have good batsmen and New Zealand team has good bowling line, so they will all out India very soon today and win the series.

India is in danger, they can lose this game too, they have to make more than 150 runs while they have just three wickets left but the good thing is that they can make it if they will play slowly and would not try to play fast and push it too hard. If they play with patience then can make it to victory as two days are left in this test match.
However the New Zealand bowlers have other plans, they are on fire and I think they will not allow Indian team to chase this score. It was another bad innings for the Indian team losing 7 wickets and making only 200 runs.  

The second Test game between India and New Zealand is ended. In the first match New Zealand defeated India and in this match too, India was defeated 2-0 continues. New Zealand batsmen scored 259 runs in the first innings. In which the most runs were from Devon Conway scored 76 runs brilliant inning.  then Rachin scored 65 runs Ravindra had the highest number of runs by the NZ batsmen in the first innings. Shubman and Yashasvi started well but other player's didn't. NZ side Tom Latham had the most runs among the New Zealand batsmen scored 86 runs  After that Glenn Phillips scored 48 runs off 82 balls.  Indian batsmen Yashasvi was the top scorer with 77 runs off 65 balls.  Santner doing his job best took 6 wickets. India lose this game by big 113 runs margin and lost the series after a long time in India.

[CryptoBuds]

The second Test game between India and New Zealand is ended. In the first match New Zealand defeated India and in this match too, India was defeated 2-0 continues. New Zealand batsmen scored 259 runs in the first innings. In which the most runs were from Devon Conway scored 76 runs brilliant inning.  then Rachin scored 65 runs Ravindra had the highest number of runs by the NZ batsmen in the first innings. Shubman and Yashasvi started well but other player's didn't. NZ side Tom Latham had the most runs among the New Zealand batsmen scored 86 runs  After that Glenn Phillips scored 48 runs off 82 balls.  Indian batsmen Yashasvi was the top scorer with 77 runs off 65 balls.  Santner doing his job best took 6 wickets. India lose this game by big 113 runs margin and lost the series after a long time in India.

India lost this match too due to poor performance of their batsmen. In the first match as well, we saw erratic performances from the Indian batsmen. And due to bad batting, India lost the first match too. In the second match also we do not see any improvement in the performance of the Indian batsmen. India scored only 156 runs in the first innings and India scored only 245 runs in the second innings. India lost by 113 runs.

New Zealand won the first two of the 3-match series. Since the series was India's home series, I thought New Zealand team would not be able to take advantage in this series. But the Indian batsmen failed to bat well against the New Zealand bowlers. If the Indian batsmen continue to bat so erratically and weakly in the third match as well, then India will lose the last match of the series as well.

[LDL]

What a brilliant showing from New Zealand against India in this Test series. Made me wonder why they aren't producing results like these in T20 or ODI formats and are still rocking pretty solid in Test Cricket, maybe others team have adopted the fast pace of cricket much better than them and they are still stuck with their ideology? Could be anything but this series win from them against a team like India is amazing.

Nice try from Washington though.

No one could have imagined that a team like New Zealand would beat India at India's own venue to secure a Test series win. New Zealand have secured the series win with one match remaining in the three-match Test series. New Zealand defeated India by a huge margin of 8 wickets in Bangalore and by a huge margin of 113 runs in Pune. It is not easy for Indian fans to imagine that New Zealand, ranked number 5 in Tests, will ensure number one India a series win at their own venue like this. The failure of India's top order is considered to be one of the main reasons for the defeat in this Test series.

[As-Soon-As]

The New Zealand team won the second test match by 113 runs, congratulations to the New Zealand team, they played brilliantly on Indian soil. But the Indian team must express a lot of regret here that they could not show this performance against New Zealand with the performance they have played in the previous matches. As a result of the series, New Zealand already won the series by two matches, but it must be a pity for India that they lost at their home ground. However, the New Zealand team batted well from the start and their bowling lines were excellent, due to which they managed to keep India under control. Man of the match was adjudged today by Mitchell Santner who had a brilliant bowling performance picking up 6 wickets. But anyway I say India must take good decisions for the next match, and try to win even if it's a series match or else they will be a whitewash of the Test series.

Of course, the New Zealand team is powerful in its match, beating India at the Indian ground. Bowler Mitchell Santner played the main role of New Zealand team to win this match. He gave the best bowling performance in this match. Although his overs had a higher run rate, he took the highest number of wickets. A total of 6 wickets have been collected, and the wickets are aggressive batsman Rohit Sharma Shubman Gill, Yashasvi Jayswal these three batsmen are in the top order. And as the first physical trio of the attacking department fell, the Indian team began to tremble, and more wickets continued to fall, and finally the Indian team lost at home by 113 runs.

[Popkon6]

India lost two consecutive matches, the first match was by 8 wickets and the second match was by 113 runs. Indian team fans never expected such a bad performance of Indian team on their home ground, although every team is strong at their home ground, India team was helpless against the bowling and batting of New Zealand team. Because India's batting performance is not good in bowling, the New Zealand team won the Test series. As the final third is unlikely to perform under pressure, a win for the Indian team will ultimately save some of their reputation. Because there is no possibility of Indian team winning on the soil of the country so far, but let's see how the Indian team can perform in the third match.

In the second innings of this second match, India was defeated by one bowler, Mitchell Santner who single-handedly picked up six wickets for the first three top-order batsmen who were the heart of India's run-scoring team.