'Will not pick Prasidh Krishna...': England great blasts India pacer for poor display in Edgbaston Test, wants this player in playing XI

Prasidh Krishna's return to Test cricket has been anything but smooth. The pacer who recently was highly impressive for the Gujarat Titans in Indian Premier League (IPL) 2025, has been taken to the cleaners by England batters in both the Tests of the ongoing series so far. Krishna gave away 72 runs in his 13-over spell at Edgbaston and was the Indian bowler with the highest economy rate.

He also failed to pick up a single wicket for the Men in Blue during the innings, maintaining an expensive economy of 5.50 runs per over. England wicketkeeper-batter Jamie Smith was the one who punished Krishna the most during Day 3 and he even smashed him for 23 runs in a single over.

Krishna proved to be quite expensive in the first Test as well

The same had happened in the first Test as well where despite taking three scalps, Krishna gave away 128 runs in his 20-over spell in England's first innings and followed that up by leaking 92 runs in his 15-over spell on the second occasion as the hosts chased down the target of 371 rather comfortably on Day 5 at Headingley.

Seeing his performance on Day 3 of the Edgbaston Test, former England cricketer Michael Atherton stated that rather than picking Krishna in the playing XI, India should have opted to go for left-arm spinner Kuldeep Yadav in the second Test.

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"I wouldn't pick this gentleman, Prasidh Krishna. I would have picked Kuldeep Yadav," Atherton said while commentating.

After having restricted England to 84/5 at one stage, the hosts managed to post a mammoth total of 407 on the board thanks to the record-breaking 303-run partnership between Harry Brook and Jamie Smith. Both the batters went on to score fabulous tons as the Indian pacers failed to bowl deliveries even close to the 145 kph mark. Former India pacer Varun Aaron showed no mercy and heavily criticized the speedsters for bowling too many short deliveries during the match.

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"Too many bouncers, too many short balls. On a slow pitch, when none of your bowlers are consistently pushing the 145 kph mark, you cannot afford to bowl that many short deliveries. Indian bowlers have the skill to keep it on that ideal length — keep hitting the stumps. Sustained pressure is what gets you wickets. You can't expect things to happen immediately all the time," Aaron said on JioHotstar.

Meanwhile, Mohammed Siraj and Akash Deep were the only Indian bowlers who managed to get wickets in England's first innings of the second Test. While the former recorded brilliant figures of 6/70, the latter picked up the remaining four scalps, giving away 88 runs in the process.