The 4-1 collection scoreline, he added, might have been very completely different had England seized their alternative in Ranchi. After two days of the fourth Test, India have been going through a 100-plus first-innings deficit having slipped to 177 for 7 in reply to 353, just for Dhruv Jurel’s hard-fought 90 to flip the tide and permit his staff’s spinners to put the stress again on England.
“We never really lost faith and had the same attitude, as you can tell from some of our press!” Crawley mentioned, as he joked about a number of the extra outlandish expressions of optimism that got here out of the England camp in the middle of the tour.
“We had the same attitude throughout and I don’t think that is arrogance. We genuinely believed in ourselves and thought we could win the series. We were in all the games. We certainly weren’t in the games when I was in India last time, so we gave ourselves a good chance and we weren’t quite clinical enough, like they were, to be fair.
“We ought to have gained in Ranchi to make it 2-2 and then you definately by no means know the way the final one goes, however it’s all the time arduous to wrestle the momentum again. Over 5 days, their expertise are all the time going to come out, and they’re an outstanding staff. It was a extremely satisfying tour although, we gave it a great crack, and there’s a lot to study from.”
“Hopefully I can push on from right here however I definitely really feel in a greater place now than I did firstly of final yr,” Crawley said. “Whenever I strive to keep [my form], I feel you begin getting worse, so I’m all the time wanting to enhance.
“Against spin, I was trying to get forward to smother the ball and it kind of worked for me. My head is a lot further forward than it used to be in my set-up. But mainly it’s just my attitude. I am trying to embrace failure more and accepting it is part of the game. So, I’m trying to stick with that.”
Crawley’s confidence towards India’s seamers, notably on the drive, continued a theme that started along with his memorable first-ball 4 towards Pat Cummins within the Ashes. And, consistent with his position as the primary batter in an aggressive line-up, he admitted that going toe-to-toe with the opposition assault leaders was very a lot a part of his gameplan.
“I was certainly conscious of that in the summer against the Aussies,” he mentioned. “I just thought, ‘there are a couple of good balls in here, I just need to put them under pressure early’, so that was more of a conscious effort.
“I really feel like a bit extra tempo on the ball has all the time suited my recreation a bit bit extra,” he added. “I simply assume much less after they’re bowling quick. You have to calm the mind and calm the thoughts and simply react. That’s all the time suited me quite than the Tim Murtaghs of the world the place you play seven completely different photographs earlier than it comes down and that has by no means been my forte, however I’ll attempt to get higher at that as effectively.”
Crawley revealed how he had undergone laser surgery at the age of 18 to correct a short-sightedness that had required him to use contact lens, adding that one of his practice techniques when younger had been to crank the bowling machine up to full speed and play the ball from halfway down the pitch. “It was solely half-volleys however clearly 90mph would really feel very gradual by the point you return,” he said.
Even so, the challenge of facing Bumrah, with his high pace, wide range of skills and idiosyncratic action, is not something that can be easily replicated in training.
“I like going through the very best bowlers on this planet. Him, Cummins, a number of others, however he would in all probability be the very best I’ve confronted,” Crawley said. “He bowls quick anyway and lets it go later, so it feels even faster. Then it’s only a bizarre motion, so it’s arduous to decide up at instances and he has bought super talent. He swings it each methods, with a slower-ball yorker, so, yeah, he is an outstanding bowler. It was tough however I liked it.”
“Whenever I’ve regarded too far forward like that, that’s the way you get out right away,” Crawley said. “Actually, a few these events I used to be pondering, ‘I want to get an enormous rating’ and I wasn’t within the course of. That is why – so simple as that – I bought out.
“At Old Trafford in the summer, I was just trying to bat and bat time, I wasn’t thinking about getting a hundred. I was very present and it’s quite hard to get into that mindset. Whenever I’ve got into that mindset, I’ve managed to get a decent score, and if I got ahead of myself, I haven’t.”
England don’t play one other Test collection till the arrival of West Indies in July, and so there’s a lot time for the gamers to take in the teachings of the India collection.
“It just needs a bit of refinement,” Crawley mentioned. “We always talk about absorbing pressure and putting pressure back on. The last couple of years we’ve done the putting back on pretty well, and we’ve spoken about maybe picking those moments to absorb at the right times as well. We can certainly refine that.
“That’s not to say we’re going to get extra destructive. We will nonetheless strive to play the way in which we now have and take a look at to rating shortly, however simply decide these moments the place they’re on prime. We want to be certain we stay constructive and do not let a tricky consequence get in the way in which of what we’re performed rather well during the last couple of years.
“[India] have won 17 home series on the spin, so it would have had to be pretty special for us to turn it over and we will not get too down on ourselves. We’ll still stick to what we know but just be slightly better.”
Andrew Miller is UK editor of ESPNcricinfo. @miller_cricket