“We don’t play a lot on slow, low wickets and the more we can do that, the better. You only become better in these conditions by playing in them and making mistakes,” says England captain Eoin Morgan after seven-wicket loss to India; watch game three from 1pm, Tuesday, Sky Sports Cricket
Eoin Morgan welcomed his England side facing India on a slow pitch in the second T20 in Ahmedabad – despite having their “weakness exposed” as they slipped to a seven-wicket defeat.
England posted 164-6 before India – thanks to Virat Kohli (73no off 49 balls) and debutant Ishan Kishan (56 off 32) – reached their target with 13 balls to spare to draw level in the five-match series, which continues on Tuesday.
The T20 World Cup will be held in India in October and November and Morgan says any experience of tricky surfaces now will stand England in good stead going into that event.
“The pitch was slow and low and one thing that does is expose our weakness on these surfaces a little bit,” said Morgan, whose side won the series opener by eight wickets on Friday.
“We don’t play a lot on slow, low wickets, and the more we can do that, the better. You only become better in these conditions by playing in them and making mistakes.
“You tend to learn quicker if you are winning, confident and everything rolls smoothly but equally if we have to learn the hard way we are still going through that process.
“We’re trying to learn game on game so that when it comes to the World Cup we can be best prepared and know more about ourselves.
“The pitch in the first game really suited us – it had more pace in it and was probably similar to a Cardiff wicket – but this took us out of our comfort zone. It was a typical Indian wicket that we would play on in an IPL game.
“You talk about posting a total on a wicket like that and I thought we were right in the game.
“We did a lot of the structure of our innings really well. We established partnerships and got to the point where we tried to accelerate but managed to lose wickets at different stages.
“I thought we could have been a bit more accurate in the lines and lengths that we bowled. When we went back to the basics of taking pace off the ball, we didn’t do that well enough.
“Your accuracy has to be on as you are bowling to guys on their home patch so the bowlers are up against it. India managed to get away from us quite quickly.”
Both games in this series have been won by the side batting second but Morgan does not feel the toss has become too crucial to the outcome of the game.
He said: “The advantage is always with the guys batting second but there was definitely more dew in the first game than the second so there wasn’t a complete disparity between innings.
“In the next game, because we are playing on red soil and not the black soil, there is a chance it might take more spin which probably lends itself to batting first as the wicket might get worse.”
Morgan also hopes to have fast bowler Mark Wood – who missed Sunday’s match with a bruised left heel – back for Tuesday’s fixture or Thursday’s fourth game at the latest.
The captain added: “It’s not a big worry. He felt better today [Sunday] but not fit enough to play.”
