'A little disappointing': Rishabh Pant admits SA dominated; India slump to huge defeat

NEW DELHI: India crashed to their biggest-ever decision successful Test cricket connected Wednesday, losing by a staggering 408 runs to South Africa successful the 2nd Test successful Guwahati arsenic the visitors wrapped up a 2-0 bid whitewash — their archetypal bid triumph connected Indian ungraded successful 25 years.

The rout besides marked 1 of India’s astir forgettable location performances successful caller memory, exposing heavy cracks successful some batting resilience and tactical clarity.Go Beyond The Boundary with our YouTube channel. SUBSCRIBE NOW!Chasing a near-impossible 549-run target, India folded meekly for 140, with lone Ravindra Jadeja (54 disconnected 87) offering resistance. Off-spinner Simon Harmer delivered a masterclass connected a turning surface, claiming 6/37, his best-ever Test figures, and finishing with a lucifer haul of 9 wickets.

India’s batters, already battered by Marco Jansen’s bounce successful the archetypal innings, had small effect to Harmer’s relentless accuracy and drift.

Stand-in skipper Rishabh Pant minced nary words aft the humiliating loss, saying India needed to “learn fast” from the defeat.“It’s a small disappointing. As a squad we request to get better. Credit to the absorption — they dominated the series,” Pant said.He added that muddled reasoning outgo India dearly: “We needed to beryllium wide with our mindset.

Cricket demands capitalising arsenic a team, and we didn’t bash that. That outgo america the full series.”South Africa, meanwhile, played near-flawless cricket. Beyond Harmer’s brilliance, Aiden Markram produced a once-in-a-generation fielding display, taking 9 catches, the astir by immoderate outfielder successful a Test match, breaking Ajinkya Rahane’s long-standing record.Markram credited the bowlers for enabling the record: “Didn’t cognize astir it! Credit to the bowlers — they kept putting the shot successful the close areas and you conscionable effort to drawback them.”Reflecting connected the bid win, helium added: “No casual task coming to India and winning. We had nary preconceived ideas astir conditions. You don’t privation demons successful your caput earlier facing your archetypal ball.”South Africa dominated each league of the bid — from Senuran Muthusamy and Jansen’s defining basal connected Day 2, to disciplined bowling crossed some Tests. For India, the decision is simply a wake-up call: tactical lapses, batting failures, and deficiency of adaptation were ruthlessly punished.Brief Scores: