I've not been able to actually see any of this series. Obviously India are the world's no. 1 team at the moment but do their spinners really move the ball? I expect "yes". And "we" (our motley crew of South Africans and New Zealanders) tend not to play genuine spin too well because we never see it at county level because we only have slow bowlers rather than spinners, since the retirement of Graeme Swann, who really could move the ball. That said, this has all been a bit pathetic, hasn't it?
It is of course the pitches in India. They take a hell of a lot more turn than English pitches. Or indeed the hard, bouncy tracks you find everywhere else in the world. The Indians always exploit this.
I think the 4-0 result looks worse than it actually was. I watched quite a lot of theis series and much of the time England played quite well. Not taking anything away anything from India - they were the better side.
The biggest problem IMO is that the England team just didn't want to be there. They didn't want to go to Sri Lanka and there sure as hell didn't want to tour India straight afterwards. I'm not surprised by the collapse on the final session of the final day of the final test. They'd long had their flights home booked just a few hours after the final test was due to finish. They just wanted to get out of there.
India is the hardest place to go and win. Of course England
did win in 2012 and that is almost entirely down to attitude. Of course, the old guard of Cooke, Broad, Anderson etc were all still in their 20s. Plus there were players like Swann and Pietersen. They went on that tour with the attitude "LET'S. FUCKING. DO THIS!". They went on this tour with the attitude of "Ohhh, do we have to?".
Cooke will almost certainly go as captain now and we must bring through the younger players. Get some fighting spirit back. The talent is there, but at the moment, the application isn't...
Just my two penn'orth