WTC Final: It was an unplayable ball, but if he could have drop his wrists had he been on the backfoot – Sunil Gavaskar on Virat Kohli’s dismissal

Indian legend Sunil Gavaskar feels Virat Kohli could have avoided his dismissal had he been on the back foot rather than on the front foot in the first innings of the World Test Championship final against Australia at the Oval on Thursday.

Mitchell Starc bowled a peach of a delivery, out of the blue to Virat Kohli, that jumped off from a length and had the batter in discomfort. The ball took the bat’s splice and Kohli’s thumb as Steve Smith took a good catch above his head at the second slip.

With only two bouncers allowed every over, Gavaskar reckons the modern-day batters set themselves on the front foot and it is not easy for them to play on the back foot.

“Off the backfoot,” Sunil Gavaskar told Star Sports when he was asked how could a batter deal with that delivery from Starc.

“You could have a look again, today because of the fact that there are only two bouncers per over, most batters are onto the front foot. This means they are not able to get onto the backfoot and give themselves the extra yard where you could have probably let the ball go by dropping your wrists.

“Yes, it was a tough delivery because he was so committed to the front foot that he was not able to withdraw his bat at the last moment. If he had been on the back foot.

“It looked like an unplayable ball, but if he had been on the backfoot, he would have been able to drop his wrists,” Gavaskar added.

There was no doubt that it was a snorter from Mitchell Starc. In fact, the left-arm pacer was leaking runs in his spell and suddenly bowled a jaffa to get rid of Kohli, who could only score 14 runs.

Analysing Shubman Gill and Cheteshwar Pujara’s dismissal, Gavaskar added the batters’ bat was in the air and not close to the ball. Both the batters made the error in judgment of line and length as they decided to leave the ball, which castled their stumps. Gavaskar added the key to batting success in English conditions is to play as late as possible.

“Yes, they could have possibly not had their bats high up in the air. One of the essentials of batting in England is to play the ball as late as possible.

“So, it means, if you are looking to play the ball as late as possible, your bat is nearer to the ball, not up in the air. Because it was up in the air, they allowed the ball to go through. With the bat up in the air, they were not able to bring it down when the ball nipped in,” Gavaskar added.

India is struggling at 151-5 and they are trailing by a huge margin of 318 runs after Australia posted an above-par score of 469.