It was a beautiful, sunny second day in Dharamsala. So beautiful and sunny, in fact, that the travelling England supporters could have been forgiven for choosing to potter around the winding streets of McLeod Ganj, maybe walk to the Bhagsunag waterfall, or to hike up to the temple near Dharamkot, where the pine trees are draped with Tibetan flags.
Still, there may well be some spare time at the end of this fifth Test, India having served up three further sessions of punishment to bring a quick kill and a 4-1 series win into view. At stumps, having underlined the ease of the surface that England squandered 24 hours earlier, the hosts closed on 473 for eight, an ominous 255 runs ahead.
Had anyone opted for sightseeing over English suffering, the aesthetically-inclined among them would have missed some pretty glossy strokeplay from India; two finessed, practically frictionless centuries from Rohit Sharma (103) and Shubman Gill (110) followed by a pair of fun fifties from newcomers Devdutt Padikkal (65) and Sarfaraz Khan (56).
On the English side of the ledger, there were some notable strikes among the seven mustered on the day. Primus inter pares was Ben Stokes, maddened by a wicketless morning and self-flagellating after the duck in his side’s 218 all out, sending down this first ball since Lord’s last summer – a gap of 251 days – and instantly hitting the jackpot.
It broke the “pinky promise” given to the team physio about not bowling on this tour following last November’s knee surgery, Stokes motoring in after lunch and sending down a beauty to Sharma that angled in, decked away, and pinged off stump. Cue the famous Graham Gooch line to Ian Botham – “Who writes your scripts?” – amid the mix of shock and delight.
Enter Jimmy Anderson, removing a second previously indelible man in Gill the very next over when the ball this time jagged in and bowled his mark for Test wicket number 699. The 41-year-old was left waiting on his 700th thereafter, however, sending down just 10 overs across three spells and completely unused in the final session.
India were already 61 runs ahead, three wickets down, after the post-lunch double-strike and soon stirred by a couple of players who should temper some of the chat about a weakened India team. The truth is, a bottleneck of burgeoning talent has been uncorked by the hosts in this series, with a third swashbuckling half-century for Sarfaraz one example.
Supporting the theory was debutant Paddikal, an utterly-butterly left-hander whom Moeen Ali might consider suing for copyright infringement if the pair weren’t old pals from the Indian Premier League. A little taller, granted, but another dream-weaver all right, lacing 10 fours and becoming the fifth man past 50 when lofting Shoaib Bashir for a straight six.
This was not an entirely unfamiliar sensation for Bashir, the young off-spinner’s neck craned some eight times by sixes in this innings, the joint-most struck off an England bowler and a second reason for Moeen – moosed eight times by Australia at Edgbaston during last summer’s Ashes – to have litigious thoughts from afar.
Equally the young off-spinner held his nerve here, figures of four for 170 from 44 overs built on another marathon spell of 21 overs, three for 59. He broke the fourth-wicket stand of 97 with his first ball after tea when Sarfaraz wafted to slip, cleaned up Paddikal with a beauty and saw Dhruv Jurel hole out on 15. There should have been a fifth, too, Kuldeep Yadav dropped on 23 in the penultimate over when an under-edge on to boot evaded Stokes at gully.
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And so ended a day frustration for the tourists and a golden one for India, Tom Hartley’s cheap removals of Ravindra Jadeja and Ravichandran Ashwin having been followed an unbroken, impish stand of 45 between Kuldeep and Jasprit Bumrah; the kind that Mark Wood, none for 89 from 15 overs, might have snuffed out on one of this better days.
But after claiming 20 wickets in the first two Tests, England have struggled to deliver the requisite threat with the ball since. Little wonder Stokes felt compelled to step in, his five-over spell – one that saw him drop a return catch off Sarfaraz, only to discover it was a no-ball – driven by the desperation Sharma and Gill induced first thing.
Their 171-run second-wicket stand may have been a contrast of body shapes but not style, both right-handers playing with crisp precision by way of technique and shot selection. It felt coming, too, not least when Sharma crashed Bashir for a six and a four in the third over of the day, and Gill followed this up with an advancing flat, straight six off Anderson.
Both were toying with Stokes, gaps produced by field manoeuvres instantly targeted, bowling changes met with thumping responses. Just one chance came, an edge off Sharma on 68 flying past leg slip and Zak Crawley only grasping at fresh mountain air.
Sharma’s century, from 154 balls, came with a fiddled single and humble raise of the bat, Gill’s, from 147 balls, via a swept four and a more elaborate doff of the cap. India’s top three all have two centuries apiece in this series, another sign of the growing gulf.
