Under Virat Kohli's captaincy, India would not have lost Hyderabad Test to England - Vaughan's BOLD claim

Former England captain Michael Vaughan has made a bold claim. Ahead of the second Test between India and England, which gets underway on Friday (Feb 2) in Visakhapatnam, Vaughan stated that India missed Virat Kohli's presence in the series opener, in Hyderabad, and would not have lost the Test under his captaincy. Rohit Sharma-led India lost the Hyderabad Test by 28 runs, failing to chase down 231, despite taking a whopping 190-run lead. Ben Stokes & Co. rode on Ollie Pope's 196 in their second essay and debutant Tom Hartley's 7 for 62 in India's run-chase to win the game.

Vaughan opened up on the Hyderabad loss for India on the Club Prairie Fire show. He stated, "They miss Virat Kohli's captaincy massively in Test cricket. Under Virat's captaincy that week, India wouldn't have lost the game." He added, "Rohit is a legend and a great player. But I felt he just switched off completely."

It is to be noted that this was the first time that India lost a Test match at home after taking a 100-plus lead in the first innings. Talking about Kohli's captaincy, no opposition team scored more than 400 runs in their second innings in a Test in India during his tenure. When Kohli was the Indian Test captain, India only lost two out of 31 Tests at home. On the other hand, Rohit has already lost two out of the seven Tests as captain at home. In addition, India are winless at home in three Tests at a stretch for the first time in 12 Tests.

Thus, Rohit's Test captaincy is under the scanner at the moment. He is not going to have it easy in the ongoing five Tests versus England, who are all charged up after the Hyderabad win. Ahead of the second Test, India were dealt twin blows as Ravindra Jadeja and KL Rahul were ruled out with injury concerns. Moreover, Kohli will only return in the third Test. 

Trailing 0-1, India have their task cut out in the upcoming Vizag Test. 

Rohit Sharma (C), Shubman Gill, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Shreyas Iyer, KS Bharat (WK), Dhruv Jurel (WK), Ravichandran Ashwin, Axar Patel, Kuldeep Yadav, Mohd. Siraj, Mukesh Kumar, Jasprit Bumrah (VC), Avesh Khan, Rajat Patidar, Sarfaraz Khan, Washington Sundar, Sourabh Kumar.