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This was supposed to be the dawn of a new era for the three-time T20 World Cup champions, who chose to move on from the Suryakumar Yadav era despite the Mumbaikar shepherding his troops to an unprecedented successful defence of the crown on home turf in March. Suryakumar’s batting form was held against him when he was summarily axed as leader and dumped from the squad. Whether the decision-makers are now second-guessing their radical call isn’t clear, unlike the seemingly inexorable tailspin the world’s No. 1 outfit has embarked on, highlighted by a crushing loss to England in Tuesday’s third T20I in Nottingham.

This wasn’t just another defeat, but an embarrassing rout that spoke to a distinct lack of application, commitment, commonsense and bottle. On a slightly tricky surface which was hardly a minefield – England did amass 201 – India cut a sorry figure as one batter after another made a beeline to the dressing-room. The 125-run humiliation was India’s heaviest defeat in their T20I history. As chastening as that statistic is, what was worrisome was a seeming casualness which prompted Shreyas to term the overall performance as ‘atrocious.’

When India headed to Ireland towards the end of June, the near-unanimous view was that the two matches in Belfast would be mere glorified practice runs ahead of their visit to England. Maybe the team entertained the same view, because they weren’t entirely switched on in bowler-friendly conditions and were promptly punished by the hosts in a classic David-felling-Goliath scenario playing itself on loop.

India’s top order has repeatedly disappointed, paying the price for not respecting the quality of the bowling and the nature of the pitches in Ireland and England. Tuesday was the most humbling example of their straitjacketed aggressive approach which has paid handsome dividends on batting beauties, but which is an open invitation to disaster when the ball does even the minutest of things in the air or off the surface.

India haven’t gone with a second-string batting unit. Barring the injured Hardik Pandya, no one who ought to have been on this summer safari is missing. What has gone missing is the quantum and quality of runs India have amassed historically; the blazing opening starts have been conspicuously absent despite the prodigious Vaibhav Sooryavanshi replacing a misfiring Sanju Samson and becoming India’s youngest international cricketer, while the middle order has shown few signs of making up for the lack of substance from its predecessor.

England ran 47 singles and nearly a third of that number in twos at Trent Bridge, where hitting through the line wasn’t feasible. If India were watching – misfields galore beg that question – then clearly, they hadn’t taken note because from the beginning, they played with the insouciance of the millionaires they are. Not even when the first three batters perished inside the first four overs did they recalibrate or revisit their gung-ho methodology. One is pretty sure that wasn’t the case, but the impression from the outside was that they didn’t really care, because the munificence in gifting Jofra Archer and Josh Tongue – who made his T20I debut in the previous outing on Saturday – was obvious even to the casual onlooker.

Thumped 2-0 by the Irish and now having no chance of winning this series, the only time India have avoided defeat on this tour was when the first T20I was abandoned after India posted a competitive 189 for seven in Chester-le-Street. Shreyas himself hasn’t had a particularly productive time, a highest of 68 in Durham in the no-result bookended by scores of 3, 10 (against Ireland), 37 and 5. Reintegrated with the T20I set-up after two and a half years, and that too as the new leader tasked with carrying the team to the next T20 World Cup , Shreyas has had a horror initiation; the prospect of a complete washout is more genuine now than at any time in India’s 19 and a half years as a 20-over entity.

Coach Gautam Gambhir and his support staff can’t be absolved either, powerless in stopping their wards hurtling from one disappointing loss to another. India have two more shots at singing the redemption song, but it will take a very brave, very naïve or very passionate follower to expect a different result if the attitude remains foolhardily unaltered.