After the completion of the India vs South Africa series, former India cricketer, Sanjay Manjrekar believes that one of the main reasons behind India's loss against South Africa at Centurion was purely due to poor performance by their bowlers and went onto defend Shardul Thakur despite his disappointing performance in the first Test. Thakur was dropped from the playing XI for the second Test at Cape Town due to his poor performance in the first Test of the series where he was able to pick only one wicket in his spell of 19 overs where he conceded 101 runs. The right-arm seamer, Mukesh Kumar replaced Thakur for the second Test where the bowler snapped four wickets in the match. Manjrekar opined that the entire Indian bowling team failed collectively in the first Test and that the think tank may have desired a better batter at No. 8, where Thakur excels.
"I understand why they wanted batting depth with Shardul, especially given that they have new players batting at 1,3 & 5 and also Shardul's record in South Africa. I think it is unfair to blame everything on Shardul Thakur. I feel India generally didn't bowl well in that Test match and that didn't allow them a series win," Manjrekar was quoted as saying on ESPNcricinfo.
"I fear Shardul Thakur will have to wait a while to play his next Test match. They will have to look at his bowling. It is not that he scored 40-50 with the bat either. He might not play a Test match for a while now as India will find other ways of strengthening their batting," the former right-hand batter added.
Talking about the second Test match was finished in just less than two days in favour of India. The visitors won the match by seven wickets and this victory was recorded as the fastest win in the history of cricket in terms of balls (642 balls).