How Team India's Test fortunes changed from Gabba 2021 to Newlands 2022

Newlands Cape Town, a picturesque cricketing ground, hosted a historic decider test between two greats of the game: a David-like South Africa and a Goliath-like Team India. The series decider was enough of a reminder of a similar test almost a year ago, halfway around the world at the Gabba in Australia. And in an uncanny coincidence, the fragile David-like side dominated the Goliath-like side to win the historical series.

The South African team has wonderfully started 2022 by winning two consecutive tests against the star-studded Indian team, breaching India's southern continental fortress of the Wanderers and holding a fortress at Newlands. Although winning on home soil in familiar conditions is not a significant achievement for the home team, one must acknowledge the challenge and the opposition they face.

Team India, in the past, have defeated Australia and England in challenging conditions and asserted their dominance by winning the Boxing Day Test. South Africa's impressive comeback reminded everyone of the similar defiance showcased by the Indian side just a year ago.

The unsung hero shines

A few similarities between both the tests were — Rishabh Pant counterattacking a strong opposition bowling attack, and a prime bowler (Pat Cummins in the Gabba Test and Bumrah in Newlands) taking a fifer in a losing cause.

Both these Tests had strong batting performances from young and inexperienced batter to get their side closer to the opposition total.

In the Gabba, Shardul Thakur, in the second test of his career, played a remarkable innings 67, which took India just 31 runs behind Australia's first innings total. Keegan Petersen played a similar innings of 72 to take South Africa just 13 runs behind India.

Both innings had youngsters challenging strong opposition bowling in a calm, composed and calculated manner.

Youngsters lead the pack

Another similarity between these tests is the relentless bowling attack by the winning side, again led by a youngster in the second innings. Siraj took the fifer to limit Australia's lead and India's eventual target at the Gabba. Similarly in Newlands, Marco Jansen took the lead and gave South Africa crucial breakthroughs in his 4/36 spell that gave them an achievable target to chase.

Team India's fragile middle order

The crucial difference between Gabba and Newlands tests was the stronger the team's control of batting. At the Gabba, the Australian batting was extremely assertive and took a significant total in both innings. India's batting, barring Kohli's performance, was fragile.

Before Rishabh Pant charged against the South African attack in the second innings, Kohli had to pace his side and take it to a respectable total.

Studying from Jonty Rhodes' playbook

Also, in terms of overall alertness on the field, India looked weak compared to South Africa, dropping crucial catches and giving away easy singles or doubles.

Virat Kohli's exit from captaincy

Team India was dominated in the final two tests and as a group, they were asked many questions about team selections and overall performance on the field. After losing the test and the series, Virat Kohli reportedly sat down with Dravid and informed him of his decision to resign from the captaincy.

This is a huge setback for the team to know that they will not have a captain who raised their game to lead from the next game. Kohli's decision to resign from the Test captaincy has left the team and selectors staring into the magnitude of the questions with a lot of introspection to be done.

Cricket is a complex game that involves a high level of concentration, athleticism, and performance at the same time. In the case of India at the Gabba, they had each of these aspects going their way, which resulted in them winning the test and eventually winning the series in Australia.

But in the Newlands Test, India lacked clinical performance from their key stalwarts, failed to win critical battles against South Africa, and showed poor athleticism. That eventually resulted in India's prolonged wait to win a Test series on South African soil.

The South African team planned, executed, and performed everything to almost perfection to clinically clinch the series. The South African side is undoubtedly on the trajectory of a bigger and brighter future. Team India, on the other hand, needs a new captain immediately, along with a solid action plan if they desire to continue their upward trajectory.