Sadagoppan Ramesh opined that the Indian team didn't take Ireland seriously, thinking that they would beat them without much fuss. His remark came after the Men in Blue were beaten by Ireland in the first T20I at the Civil Service Cricket Club in Belfast on Friday, June 26, by 34 runs.

The former India opener lauded Ireland for using the bigger boundaries tactically and testing the Indian batters out with short-pitched deliveries. Ramesh urged Shreyas Iyer and Co. to be confident but not overconfident and look past Ireland.

"Ireland deserve praise for using the bigger boundaries and testing the Indian batters out with the short delivery. It was clear that India played the match casually. They thought the Ireland series was a picnic tour, which they'll win easily and were serious only about the England series. But Ireland taught India a lesson by saying this is no picnic spot," Ramesh said on his YouTube channel.

"The Ireland series was not even originally scheduled. It was like a pickle to the main course, which was England. But India embarassingly couldn't handle the spice of the pickle, which is Ireland. Irrespective of what excuses can be cooked up for this, it's a shocking and terrible defeat for Team India. Overconfidence is never healthy and it's because of that, India's story was over last night. India must be confident but not overconfident," he added.

Ramesh said that while a defeat here and there is understandable, losing to Ireland is inexplicable because the Indian players have played so much cricket in recent times, especially in the shortest format, having won the T20 World Cup earlier this year and then going on to play the Indian Premier League.

"Yes, even an elephant occasionally slips up. But how can it happen against an Ireland? This is a shocker, especially for a team whose last T20 match was the final of a World Cup. After a month of T20 cricket in the World Cup, all the Indian players played another 3 months of IPL. To play 4 months of continuous T20 cricket and then lose to Ireland is unexplainable," said Ramesh (via the aforementioned source).

The cricketer-turned-expert highlighted India's fielding woes, especially their struggles to take high catches. On Friday, Abhishek Sharma and Shivam Dube missed relatively straightforward catches, which eventually cost India.

"India played shockingly poor cricket. They've been dropping catches from the T20 World Cup to the IPL to yesterday. They seem to always drop high catches. In the IPL, you can just bat or bowl and hide your fielding because of the Impact Player option. But in international cricket, you've to be a good fielder to be in the 11. Many players escaped in the IPL because of the Impact Player rule by just batting," he concluded.