"England will play Bumrah carefully, Bazball everyone else...": Ravichandran Ashwin

New Delhi [India], July 1 (ANI): Former Indian cricketer Ravichandran Ashwin believes England will focus on playing cautiously against Jasprit Bumrah while aggressively targeting other bowlers as part of their "Bazball" approach during the Test series against India.
"It's not about how many overs Jasprit Bumrah will bowl. It's about how we keep the pressure on if Bumrah isn't bowling. So this game is very straightforward, 'We will play Bumrah carefully and then Bazball everyone else'. That is pretty much what England will do," Ashwin said, according to Wisden.com.
India lost the Leeds Test despite five of their batters scoring centuries. Only once before has a team lost a Test after registering four hundreds. Australia against England in Melbourne (1928). The second Test begins Wednesday.
England's 371-run chase against India in the first test now stands as their second-highest successful pursuit in Test history.
Ashwin said that as a bowling unit, India should make strategies to play some defensive cricket.
"So, as a bowling unit, we should make strategies to play some defensive, negative cricket. The kind of wickets England are making, we should play negative, defensive cricket and ask our bowlers to contain them more," he added.
Ashwin felt 'going for the wickets', be it Test cricket or T20 cricket, is all a lie, and pressure gives you wickets.

"The whole point of 'going for the wickets', be it Test cricket or T20 cricket, is all a lie. Pressure gives you wickets. When a bowler keeps a batter at one end for 10 balls and then delivers a good ball, that's what we call rhythm. You have to put the batters under pressure without giving runs, bottling him up. Testing his technique inside out. So if India wants to win the second Test, play Bumrah, even Kuldeep Yadav and make sure the rest of the bowlers are bottling one end up," Ashwin added.
England needed 350 runs in the fourth innings to seal the match, and they did it comfortably in 82 overs. With this win, England go 1-0 up in the five-match test series.
India, led by Shubman Gill, will take on Ben Stokes's England in the second of the five-match Test series (Anderson-Tendulkar Trophy) at Edgbaston in Birmingham starting from Wednesday. (ANI)