South Africa’s stand-in skipper Wiaan Mulder decided against chasing Brian Lara’s world record of scoring 400 runs in a single Test innings, saying the milestone should remain with the West Indies great. In the match against Zimbabwe, Mulder, despite being the captain himself, decided to declare South Africa’s innings at 367 runs. As fans and former cricketers debate whether the decision was right, England great Stuart Broad has claimed that India’s Shubman Gill would’ve broken Lara’s record if he hadn’t been dismissed for 269 in the first innings of the second test at Edgbaston.

“I think India were ten out of ten. Sometimes in Test match cricket, when you get such a one-sided result, it’s easy to be critical of the other team, which is England at this time, but India were just superb. Shubman Gill 269, honestly, it looked like he could have got Lara’s record. He was just cruising. It didn’t look like anything could trouble him.

“Goodness me that move to four, spent most of his career opening the batting, moved to number four since Kohli has retired and gone to a hundred, big double, big 150. Looks like he’s got no weaknesses at all,” Broad said, speaking on the ‘For the love of cricket’ podcast.

The final day of the Test was a nervous one for the Indian team, with rain threatening their target of claiming 7 wickets on the final day. With England effectively needed to bat for 80 overs on the final day, Broad was disappointed to see his old team failing to do that.

“England could have drawn it (Test). They had to bat 80-odd overs due to the rain. I think they’ll be a bit disappointed they didn’t manage to do that. There was nothing in the surface that was a really sort of worn fifth-day pitch. They’ll be disappointed they didn’t show little more craft in the defense,” Broad said.