Whoa! What a game of cricket we just witnessed. It was bizarre, absolutely bizarre to say the least. As an Indian fan, I can look at the funny side of it all since we ended up winning it quite comprehensively in the end. Even though it lasted only for a day and a half, it was a complete rollercoaster of a game. There are going to be so many talks and debates from both sides about the pitch conditions, the skillset required to play spin, the third umpiring saga, and whatnot. So, here’s my take about the game from an Indian fan’s perspective.
Preview
Let’s start from day 1. After a break of few days in between, both teams arrived in Ahmedabad with the beautifully poised at 1-1. Looking at the third test from England’s perspective, the pink ball test was always looked at as England’s best chance to beat India. Yes, they did beat us in the first test in Chennai, which was followed by a rampant Indian comeback in the second. The venue for the third and fourth test would be the recently re-furbished Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel Stadium which is now renamed as Narendra Modi Stadium. The stadium is now the world’s largest cricket stadium in terms of crowd capacity (1,32,000 people) leaving MCG the second largest in the world. And another interesting factor which now proved to be probably the most important one, the pitch. It was quite evident after the second Chennai test that, both teams lack the necessary skillset to play spin well, barring a few exceptions in the Indian team and Joe Root for England to some extent. So even though it is a d/n game, chances are India will opt to have a dry and turning wicket and not the one which would assist the seamers a bit (a bit is also a lot in sub-continent conditions).
Odds
The early odds were always in India’s favor coming in this test match, especially after what happened in the second game in Chennai. Yes, this was also England’s biggest hope to win a game in the series has played with the pink ball a lot more than the Indian side.
Toss
The toss once again did not come as a surprise for a lot of Indian fans, as Virat hasn’t had a lot of success with the toss in the recent past. England as expected chose to bat first after winning the toss, which has sort of becoming a norm on Indian pitches. What raised a few eyebrows though, was the contrast in team selection by both teams. Again, it wasn’t something unexpected, but seeing India go with an extra spin-bowling option was definitely a first in a d/n test match. The biggest uncertainty was the pitch since it was the first game at the new venue, and understandably so both teams decided to stick to their respective strengths. England went with 4 quicks (including Stokes the fast-bowling allrounder, with Jimmy Anderson and Stuart Broad playing together in a game after a long time, and the attack was completed with Jofra Archer, England’s x-factor returning from a shoulder injury. The spin department was handled by Jack Leach along with Joe Root with his part-time off-spin. India on the other hand, keeping the 36 back in Adelaide in mind, decided to strengthen their batting, bringing Washington Sunder in for Kuldeep Yadav along with two frontline spinners in Ravi Ashwin and Axar Patel. Jasprit Bumrah who was rested earlier replaced Mohammed Siraj to complete the line-up.
The game, session by session
Ishant Sharma, playing in his 100th test, which is a phenomenal achievement for any player, more so for an Indian fast bowler (only the second man after Zaheer Khan), started the proceedings well along with Bumrah who kept things tight from his end. He didn’t have to wait too long to claim his first wicket of the match when Dom Sibley poked a good-length delivery straight to the second slip, with Rohit completing the easy proceedings. Soon after, Axar Patel, the hometown hero struck on his very first delivery accounting for Johnny Bairstow. With the visitors desperately needing a partnership, Root and Crawley steadied the ship for a while. Crawley looked like a million dollars while he lasted and made 53 runs, which turned out to be the highest individual score in England’s first innings. Axar Patel literally ran through the England batting lineup taking 6-38, but the biggest wicket of it all that of Joe Root was taken by Ravi Ashwin, who with the figures of 26-3 took a big step towards the landmark 400th wicket.
The toss advantage that England had, was neutralized by now and India if they managed to bat well in the first innings, could take the absolute control of the game in their hands. It wasn’t the easiest condition to bat on, early in the innings, but Indian openers managed to somehow survive the early nerves. But soon after, Shubman Gill played an unnecessary half-hearted pull shot which resulted in his dismissal. Che Pujara got out on a duck soon after to yet another straight incoming delivery from Leach. Captain Kohli along with Rohit steadied the ship and played some useful strokes before Kohli got out to a cut shot, resulting in getting an inside edge to his off stump. India after finishing day 1 on 99-3, started day 2 off on a good note with both Rahane and Rohit batting with a positive mindset. To be totally honest, that was the only part of the day which went according to the script for both the teams actually. Because what happened thereafter was pure madness. Leach removed both the set batsmen in quick successions, with Joe Root spun Indian lower order into his web. English skipper’s insane figures of 5-8, also his first fifer in his test career, meant that India finished with a mere lead of 34 runs. But, on that pitch, even those 34 runs were equivalent to 250-300 runs on any other pitch. In-between all this chaos and madness, Ishant Sharma became the first-ever player to hit a six in the newly built world’s largest stadium. England came to bat soon after a 15-minutes tea break. Not to anybody’s surprise, Axar Patel opened the innings with the ball. And a start it was, to what would turn out to be a nightmarish experience for the Englishmen. A wicket of the first ball of the innings, followed by a hattrick scare a ball later (given out LBW which was overturned by DRS). Axar followed it with another straight one, which went right through Bairstow’s bat and pad and clipped a bell. Sibley looked okay before edging one to ever-excited Rishabh Pant. Joe Root, the English skipper found himself trapped by the hometown hero Axar Patel while Ravi Ashwin removed Jofra Archer with a fuller one to become the second-fastest man after Muthiah Muralitharan to claim 400 test wickets.
India just needing 49 runs to win, finished the target without losing a wicket, with Rohit Sharma, hitting a 6 of Joe Root.
WTC
What does it mean to both team’s WTC chances? Well, India sits on the top of the table with still needing to win or draw the next match to qualify.
As far as England’s chances are concerned, they are officially out of the WTC finals reckoning. But they can still help their arch-rivals Australia by winning the next match.
Batting
The main focal point of the game should be the batting of both the teams, as it was horrible as honestly said by Virat Kohli in his post-match talk. The pitch looked threatening from the get-go but the wicket wasn’t the impossible one to bat on as we saw the likes of Crawley, Rohit, and Kohli to some extent made some crucial runs. For most of the part, the application and the intent to grind it out wasn’t there and that led to the downfall of most of the batters.
Bowling
The real credit of the victory has to go to the Indian spin bowlers who were far better than their English counterparts. It is fair to say that the Indian bowling was the key difference between the two teams, which helped India to get the result they wanted. Axar was magnificent with his accuracy and line and length and Ashwin, always was a class apart. Leach on the other hand for England, has improved a lot since the first test in Chennai, but there wasn’t anyone apart from Joe Root at the other end, to support him withholding the one end.
Umpiring
The umpiring wasn’t poor if I have to be totally honest. Was it questionable at times? Yes, definitely. But luckily for the umpires, none of those little errors turned into a blunder. It was the inconsistent approach towards the overall process, especially towards the visiting team which raised a few eyebrows. That left England a bit frustrated and rightly so, as they were already behind in the game and they wanted to take early wickets to try and come back in the game. The standard of the umpiring, especially the third umpiring should be highly improved from the next game but we also need to give them a little more time as it’s their first test series and standing in as an Indian umpire knowing there are a billion of people watching you from around the world, can sometimes put them under pressure too.
Going Ahead
I don’t think India will want to change anything going into the final game in the series. The spin bowling department is working very well and Axar Patel has not let India miss Ravi Jadeja with the bowl. India won’t mind a similar pitch to what we have had in the second and third games but will look to bat much better than they did her in this game. A draw looks unlikely in the final game given the quality of pitches we have witnessed so far. They’ll want to seal the series with a win and also look to seal the spot in the WTC final at Lords (18-22 June, 2020).
As far as England is concerned, they’ll look to try and take a few more positives out of this one, like the batting of Zac Crawley. Their main issue remains with playing spin and it’s interesting if they have any fightback left in them for the final game of the test series.
All in all, it is a welcome break for all the players in what is going to be a very hectic season of cricket.