Will India Play With A Different Batting Approach Against England In T20s?

Despite being ranked as the number 2 ranked team in the T20Is, Indian batting has always been considered conservative in the shortest format of the game. 

In comparison to other teams like England, New Zealand, West Indies, the batting approach India chooses to play with is a bit traditional. The Indian top-order is filled with 'batsmen' and not 'hitters', which the T20 formats. 

Be it KL Rahul, Rohit Sharma, or Virat Kohli for that matter, they all tend to take their time in the middle before going for the big hits. This has made India fall short of runs many times in the past matches. 

This issue was finally addressed by Virat Kohli in the last evenings' press conference where he accepted that the Indian batsmen approached their innings in a bit of a conservative manner. 

"We have played with a certain kind of pattern in the past. We didn't have a big tournament to work towards but if you look at the squad and the additions we've made, we've tried to address a few things that we needed in specific guys who can be X-Factors with the bat or do things which you need in T20 cricket," Kohli said. 

Kohli said that Indian batsmen will look to play more freely even if they lose a couple of wickets in the process and revealed that they have added batting depth in the squad precisely for this approach only. 

"We want to be a side that plays free cricket, not have any baggage of lack of depth and one guy having to bat long enough to make sure we get to a big total," the Indian captain said. 

"We have explosive batsmen in the team now, who can change the game at any stage, even if we're two or three wickets down. This time around you'll see guys being a bit more free, a bit more expressive. It wasn't the case before, to be honest, we didn't have enough depth in the batting to be able to play freely throughout the first 10 or 12 overs, but I see us being much more positive and free from this series onwards," he added. 

The first of the five T20I games between India and England will be played today at Narendra Modi Stadium, Ahmedabad.