India vs England : 4th Test Match at Old Trafford; Day Three :
India vs England : 4th Test Match at Old Trafford.
Anderson-Tendulkar Trophy
The power of BenRoot
Day Three:
The moving day became really special for England, they consolidated their position from 2nd day to end the day on a commanding position. A big score of 544 runs at the cost of 7 wickets and the lead of 186 runs will be a nightmare to Indian team. First time in a decade India conceded 500 uns overseas. Ben Stokes remains unbeaten at 77. The Bazball team will further add runs to give India a minimum of five sessions to bat it out. Wicket has unpredictable bounce at times and English pacers definitely will have their strategy to bowl with a plan and try to win the game convincingly. However a small ray of hope lands in India’s favour with weather forecast late on Saturday and more rains predicted on Sunday, whether India will be in a position to draw the test match. The odd performance of the pace attack barring Bumrah has opened up a big question on the credibility of pace attack.
The Indian Captain and the Coach are clueless right from finding the right combination to right direction on and off the field….The most pitiable condition of Indian Cricket. It is sheer disappointment at all levels and now the questions are being raised, why sudden retirement of the greats of Virat, Rohit? Why Shreyas is not included? What batting depth India team is adding and denying Kuldeep Yadav even to play one game, which is now more felt seeing both Jadeja and Sundar bowling the correct line and using the patches.
Barring Jadeja and Washington none of the bowlers could withstand the Stokey’s power and Root’s authority. Earlier in the morning session India toiled hard till lunch but couldn’t break the partnership. Root and Pope added 144 runs when after lunch two quick wickets of Pope (71 runs) and in form Brooks ( 3 runs) off the bowling of Washington Sundar gave initial relief to Indian team, but it was short lived with Root and Stokes continued plundering runs at ease. Ben Stokes inching towards his Century played with all authority and command giving the bowlers to ponder on their performance.
With unimaginative Captainship from Indian Captain it is not clear why Washington Sundar was not given bowling till 69th over and when Jadeja & Sundar were containing English batters and Stokes in particular, why they were taken off; just for the new ball ?
Root reached 150 runs securing his place on the top bracket of test centuries and 2nd highest run getter in tests, was eyeing the ball to perfection and making the bowlers guessing all day. However a tired looking Root with cramps was stumped of the bowling of Jadeja, not before both had a big partnership of 145 runs.
With Ben Stokes struggling for muscle cramps and retiring hurt, suddenly in the post tea session the score from 491 for 4 slipped to 527 for 7. Ultimately Bumrah and Siraj had their share of wickets. It was an alarm to the England Captain who immediately came back to arrest the slump and remained unbeaten with Dawson to continue on the 4th day. Take a bow Stokesy’s.
Ben Stokes ensured England do not loses the advantage and continues to add few more runs before declaration or they will declare at overnight score to ensure no chance of washout of the game as per the weather predictions is to be seen when the play begins.
With lead of already 186 runs and two full days of play remaining, England has an upper hand in this test match with India facing a herculean task to match the dominance and competitiveness.
All eyes are set for the 4th day as England will not take much time to add good number of runs in shortest possible time and ask India to bat with a hope to put pressure for securing quick wickets and control the game in totality.
India on the other hand will have a big opportunity to really prove their mettle and play to the merit of each delivery and stay on the wicket to play as long as possible. Already short of one batsman in Rishabh Pant the onus lies on the seniors Shubman, Rahul and Yashasvi to play the game of their life for bailing out India from dire straits.
The omission of Kuldeep Yadav, despite Akashdeep and Arshdeep's absence, was unexpected & proved disastrous. Experienced Kuldeep's unique spin could have added valuable variation to the bowling lineup since English Batsmen didn’t faced him in this summer. Meanwhile Indian batsmen need to focus on playing patiently and applying themselves in the true spirit & mindset of Test cricket."
ReplyDeleteExactly, I have mentioned and harped upon all the points and on the big disaster which is happening every day in Indian Cricket.
DeleteWe should be prepared for 3:1 loss in next two days time.
ReplyDeleteAs I told earlier, Gill must step down as Captain and so with Gambhir. I wonder how come Shreyas was not included in the team !! He should be the full time captain of the young Indian Team. How come Angshul got a chance ?? I also wonder why Kuldeep was not played. Serious mistake by the Indian think tank. After the series, thorough retrospective analysis should be done if at all we want to showcase our past record.
Whole concluding, your design of the blog is superb but the defeat will mesmerise all the great Indian fans
Yes lot of mismanagement and
DeleteYes lot of mismanagement.
DeleteExcellent coverage of the match. Absence of VK, Shreyas & Sarfraj and GG & Agarkar politics is exposed. But people are tight lipped since GG is blessed by BJP. It's really very frustrating to see how a no.1 team going down due to the internal dirty politics.
ReplyDeleteNo amount of analysis will justify absolute stupidity on display.
ReplyDeleteGautam Gambhir is a poor leader, adamant with his whims and ways in team selection- he can getaway in white ball cricket, where the focus is on containing runs while bowling - and wickets may fall in the quest of a run rate - but in test cricket bowlers need to prize out wickets with incisive bowling and the team selection think tank has to comprehend that two half bowlers do not add up to one proper specialist bowler!
ReplyDeleteAll that is left to see is whether the match is over in 4 days - or runs into Day5, and whether India concedes an innings defeat or not! Can't remember when India batted out 5 sessions to save a test match.
The story seems eerily similar to the series Down under!
This was bound to happen if u select teams on basis of IPL stats rather than red ball form, push senior legends to retire and fill the void with inexperienced mediocrity, include bits and pieces players instead of going with match winners...
ReplyDeleteAbsolutely correct.
Delete