South Africa vs India 2018: Are Team India paying the price for Kohli-Shastri's aggressive approach?

Virat Kohli has made a name for himself as an aggressive player known to dominate bowling attacks. Over the years, he has shown he can be brutally efficient at doing this and has gone on to dominate many a bowling lineups. The success this attitude has delivered for him in batting has meant Virat's captaincy has the same element of aggression as well. What this has translated into for team India is that he has asked his players to give their all on the field with sharp fielding, higher run rates while batting and more wicket-taking fields for his bowlers. Not necessarily bad you'd say, particularly if you're playing a lot in subcontinental conditions against not-so-good teams.

With a volatile personality like Ravi Shastri joining him in the dressing room, Virat's style of captaincy and managing the team has meant that a lot of established players have had a very demanding couple of years. Not necessarily bad we would think considering how most of them had begun showing improvements in their game as a result of it.

Ravichandran Ashwin is no longer a slug on the field, Bhuvaneshwar Kumar is almost a dependable batsman anywhere in the world and Cheteshwar Pujara doesn't move along at the pace of a snail on flat tracks. However, two Tests down in South Africa, how this change in game or attitude or team strategy has affected the very technique of some of the players is for everyone to see. A couple of good examples are Murali Vijay & Cheteshwar Pujara.

Murali Vijay

Murali Vijay poking at a delivery outside off looking for runs

Having made a name for himself as a dependable opener in overseas conditions, Vijay was expected to lead India from the front in South Africa. Usually known for his ability to leave a hundred balls outside off and scoring heavily later in his innings, Vijay has played very differently to how we had imagined on this tour.

While Vijay has looked to leave anything outside off with the middle stump guard early in the innings, that poke outside off looking for the boundary has got him out quite a few times, strangely uncharacteristic of this very disciplined opener.

This is the sort of change that players make in their game when the team decides to put them in roles that are not necessarily the one they are best fit for. Whether Kohli-Shastri's aggressive intent has anything to do with his change in attitude and the game is anybody's guess.

Cheteshwar Pujara

Cheteshwar Pujara has never been known for quick singles. He has never been known for having a go at the bowlers and is never the one to look for a third run on the throw. All of this has changed in 2018. Although he continues to leave many balls outside off, that static straight bat is nowhere to be seen - he is rather pushing at balls straight at him looking for fours square on the leg side early in his innings and wants to cover drive the ones going away from him looking for runs.

Not that anyone needs reminding, Pujara has been run out twice this series looking for runs that were never there. If you look at his running technique, it's quite obvious that the man will not be able to steal that elusive third run like Virat or maybe Hardik. But whether the captain's pressure has rubbed off on Pujara and he is trying to fundamentally change the way he has approached his game is one to consider at this point in time.

It's not just these two, there have been significant changes in the way Shami approaches his spells. He has, in the last couple of years or so, realised he needs to bowl longer tighter spells to get wickets rather than look for wickets every ball. This seems to have gone out of the window in South Africa with our man looking for a wicket every delivery. Perhaps the pressure of the captain favouring every-ball-wicket-takers like Bumrah?

Virat is a great player, and his aggressive approach comes naturally to him. But the fact of the matter is that some of the others in the team are potential greats on their own and should be allowed to work in their own ways to help the team achieve the goal of winning abroad.

We will have to wait and see if the captain can mature quickly to allow this to happen.