England captain Eoin Morgan said his team must improve against chinaman Kuldeep Yadav if it is to bounce back in the three-match ODI series against India. England batsmen have been at all sea while facing Kuldeep who has picked up 11 wickets in the two T20s and one ODI against the hosts. He finished with a career-best six for 25 in the series opener in Nottingham on Thursday.
When asked to explain the Kuldeep phenomenon so far, the skipper replied: "It is about identifying when he bowls well. The two grounds we've played at have offered more turn than other grounds. Today, like at Old Trafford, he turned it more than any other spinner in the game and similar to Cardiff and the way we adapted between the two games, conditions change." (MATCH SCORECARD)
"I think Lord's will be similar to Cardiff in that regard so the shift will be important, but that doesn't paper over the fact that we need to get better at playing him. He is very good and there is no getting around that. He exposes an area of our game that we need to improve on and I think that is a good thing and a healthy thing," he added. (MATCH REPORT)
The second ODI will be played at Lord's on Saturday. With only a day's time, England will be hard pressed to regroup and perform better against Kuldeep, or could end up losing a second limited-overs' series to India within a fortnight.
"Considering there is only one left-arm chinaman bowler in the world, it is not a huge concern. You play against one team and he happens to be very good. He is not any old left arm chinaman. You have to give credit where it is due. He did bowl well and we need to clarify our plans and commit to them and just be better," said Morgan.
England are struggling against Kuldeep but Morgan insisted it is not a huge concern.
"I don't think it's a huge concern. In the winter we played against Ish Sodhi, a pretty good bowler, on wickets that offered a little bit of turn. In low-scoring games, away from home, we played pretty well. It's the left arm-spin (that is an issue) he bowls well and disguises things well."
"We have played great cricket for the last six months and not come up against anybody like this, so it is a chance to improve on this area however long it might take between now and the World Cup," he said.
England were cruising after the first ten overs, but Kuldeep struck thrice in the space of 16 balls to suck out all momentum from their innings. Ben Stokes and Jos Buttler put on 93 runs and scored contrasting half centuries, but they couldn't recover as the Chinaman returned to complete his haul.
It was his second five-wicket haul within three innings on this tour, after taking 5-24 in the first T20I at Manchester.
"If I wouldn't have got out when I did, we might have been able to build a little bit of a partnership. Then when he came on for his third spell, maybe (we could have) put him under more pressure. But, when you continue to lose wickets, you have to sit in for as long as you can. When the wicket is not as effective for the seamers, you have to target the seamers. Stokes was very patient," said Morgan.
