Gavaskar lashes out at Team India’s London love, demands compulsory practice for all

London: With the each passing day following the defeat at Lord’s, the pressure is mounting on India as the fans and former cricketers are leaving no opportunity to lash out at the Virat Kohli-led Indian cricket team.

While England managed to hold their nerve to win the opening Test at the Edgbaston, Kohli and co. were outplayed at the Lord’s in the second Test as Joe Root-led England won the second Test by an innings and 159 runs to take 2-0 lead in the five-match Test series.

Sunil Gavaskar, who had earlier slammed the Indian team management for their decisions to reduce the number of the days from the practice match and taking five-day rest ahead of the first Test, has once again come down hard on India with their call to be in London longer instead of leaving for Nottingham on Tuesday.

The Indian cricket team is expected to travel to Nottingham – venue for the third Test which starts on Saturday.

"I can understand they have taken the day off today.. they are still licking the wounds of the defeat at Lord's but they should have been planning to leave for Nottingham after today which would have been the last day of the Lord's Test and practice from tomorrow," Gavaskar was quoted as saying by India Today on Monday.

The former India skipper and one of the greatest batsmen the game has ever seen also made it clear that there should be no optional practice and everyone must practice ahead of the Trent Bridge encounter.

"But clearly as we have seen from the start of the ODI series, they are in love with London. You cannot get practice facilities in London as easily as you would in Nottingham — I hope they practice from Tuesday. And there should be no optional practice. Everybody needs to get down to practice There's no such thing as optional practice when you are 0-2 down," he added.

Gavaskar once again highlighted the need of the practice matches and urged the team management to schedule some practice games between the third and fourth Test, considering there’s an eight-day gap between the two Tests.

"You don't just need net practice but practice matches also. One should strive for practice games between third and fourth Test as well when there is space. There may possibly be some new players coming in after third Test and they need some practice time as well. These things have to be thought about. I have been saying this since January when the South Africa tour was lost. But perhaps we are old fashioned, who don't understand modern day cricket," concluded Gavaskar.