For all the talk of being willing to lose to win, it’s time England didn’t let India run free again.
India are still seriously underdogs with Virat Kohli exiting the series and KL Rahul failing to pass the fitness test. They may have two middle-order players – Rajat Patidar and the uncapped Sarfaraz Khan – with just one Test appearance between them.
Shreyas Iyer has been ruled out and of the remaining top six players, only skipper Rohit Sharma has significant Test match experience and is out of form.
Shubman Gill restored some confidence with his second strike percentage in the second Test and Yashasvi Jaiswal’s double century in the opener, but England were still on the run for most of the match and the visitors achieved the second-highest innings total in India by the team. Even while chasing 399, even when facing the artistry of Jasprit Bumrah, there was a nagging feeling that they were slipping away, a reflection of their prowess in Bazball.
Wood ready for Test return
England will never admit it, but they made a mistake in selecting just one seamer for the first two Tests and here they will rebalance their attack with Mark Wood in the last 12, replacing Shoaib Bashir or Rehan Ahmed if fit. Single entry visa error. England can’t blame India’s fuss this time. It was their fault, pure and simple.
The two seamers give England more bite with the new ball and more options should the reversal occur later. Stokes denied the decision was made as a result of going against Jaiswal, but he was almost caught at leg leg when bounced by Wood in the first Test and struggled against the pace in South Africa last month.
Of course, England’s problem is to score big against Bumrah’s brilliance. He is the match winner and should be ready to go again after a week’s rest, but there are suggestions he is not happy after being promised he could be rested for the third Test. This means nothing for India after his nine wickets in Visakhapatnam and his dominance over Joe Root.
Ravi Ashwin is on 499 wickets and started to heat up England in the field in Visakhapatnam but they have dealt with him well so far, going 4 overs in this series for the first time in his career.
England need a batsman to score if they are to have any chance of controlling this Test and it seems unthinkable that they will win the series without finding Root’s touch. Eight years ago in Rajkot, three England batsmen had scored hundreds in a first innings of 537; Including Stokes himself. England’s wins in India are based on big innings; Think Kevin Pietersen and Cook in Mumbai in 2012, Root in Chennai in 2020 and Ollie Pope in Hyderabad a few weeks ago.
The risk for Bazball is that England will give the game away in their quest for dominance, as did England in the first innings in Vizag when the flying Zak Crawley took an airborne catch for 76 and his team restricted India to 114 not out below. 400 on a belt pitch, is doing an admirable job of putting the young spinners in control. England spent the week in Abu Dhabi with his family and did not train once, but perhaps he had time to reflect on missed chances. It turned out that Crawley’s 76 would be his highest score in the Test. You cannot win a match on a flat field.
But if everything comes together and Crawley, Pope and Ben Duckett have shown their form so far, Rajkot is the kind of ground where Rohit can find out what it feels like to be Pat Cummins at Old Trafford when England are in this mood. the ball flew all over the place.
Stokes to win 100th Test cap
In his 100th Test, Stokes will need to use all his tactical nous to make things happen when things don’t go his way. England have taken 40 wickets so far in this series, and have failed to take the full 20 wickets in a match in the only two Tests of the Bazball era (when they lost to South Africa by an innings and Ireland were reduced to 10 in-form players in their second innings at Lord’s).
Stokes will be willing to gamble on going down 2-1 with two Tests to play to take a 2-1 lead. The third Test match could be like Rawalpindi in December last year, where Stokes should have won the man of the match award for his captaincy alone. He and Brendon McCullum inspired their players to score 506 on the first day and then set the pace for the rest of the game, giving themselves enough time to win in the final moments of the fifth day.
England took seven points throughout the Test and Stokes gave Pakistan a real whiff by declaring his second innings at tea on day four, setting a target of 343 in four sessions on a pitch that had already scored more than 1,500 runs.
Compare this to the situation at Rajkot eight years ago, when England gave themselves little time to win and preferred to ensure they did not lose first. Alastair Cook set India on 350 in the minimum 49 overs, with England batting at 3.44 overs to make the declaration. This was the perceived way of playing on Asian flat courses at the time. Stokes changed that.
Stokes has no interest in milestones; just win. This means he won’t be emotionally rude about playing his 100th Test. “It’s just a number,” he said. Win number 15 of his captaincy career is what he cares about. This would see him move closer to Nasser Hussain (17 from 45) and Mike Brearley (18 from 31). Not that he knows or cares about these statistics.