IND v ENG, 1st Test Review: Confident Virat Kohli holds England for a tense draw

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England. (Photo Source: BCCI)

India earned a well-fought draw as they successfully fended off the nervy last session after being asked to chase 310 runs on the final day of the first Test at the SAC Stadium, Rajkot. Virat Kohli (49*) and Ravindra Jadeja (32*) made sure that there was no unlikely collapse in the final few overs of the match. In fact, the fans were more caught in the discussion whether skipper Kohli will reach his fifty or not toward the end of the day.

Kohli, batting at 48 when Adil Rashid ran in to bowl the last over, decided that it was time to shake hands and conclude the match after taking a single off the three balls before the umpires would have certainly called stumps. India can perhaps thank skipper Kohli for his resistance or otherwise the game would have certainly had a different result, considering the way Rashid and his spin folks were bowling.

England made a smart declaration. They called their innings with a lead which asked India to score just around 6 runs. It was a great attempt to lure Indians to go for the target instead of batting with a conservative approach.

Indians, needing 310 runs from 49 overs, made a poor start losing Gautam Gambhir for a duck and Pujara for 18. At a time when there is three way battle for the opening slot in the Test team, Gambhir, might have given away his chance to the earlier preferred choice of KL Rahul, who has recovered from his injury. Dhawan would have also had a breather.

There was perhaps no need to fiddle with a delivery which was heading straight behind to the keeper. Gambhir’s attempt to reach for the delivery ended up in him giving a simple catch to second slip. His departure saw India lose its first wicket without a single run being scored.

Vijay and Pujara stabilised the innings. Vijay looked in an attacking mood and sent the ball to the fence thrice against Broad and Woakes. Left-arm spinner Ansari also saw a couple of them hit against his bowling.

But, the risk taking was showing its effect as a couple of chances came England’s way. In the 9th over, Vijay scooped a tossed up delivery back at Ansari, who failed to convert the half chance as the ball popped out of hand. An over later, another opportunity arose when Pujara hit one off the leading edge straight to Broad who pout down the ball much to the disappointment for the young bowler and his team.

Just before tea, though, Pujara failed to review an lbw decision when a leg break had hit him in front of middle.

The tea session on the final day was perhaps the most exciting session one of the Test. India was forced to act on saving the Test instead of thinking of adventurous chasing effort. England needed eight wickets to win from 31 overs.  Adil Rashid grew dangerous and dangerous. Moeen Ali was playing a perfect partner to him. The amount of appeals grew and England was in the mood to review each and every one of them if allowed. They were trying for the victory.

India, on the other hand, slid deeper into trouble as they lost Vijay and Rahane, exposing the middle order. The only respite was skipper Kohli still stroking the ball in counter attacking manner trying not to give away the advantage to the Englishmen. If there was a ball to be hit, Kohli hit it. But, unfortunately, the sight of losing his partners at regular intervals tied him up from going all out against the English bowlers.

Ashwin (32) gave some support to his captain. The off-spinner contributed largely during the pair’s 47 runs stand for the 5th wicket. More importantly, the duo consumed 15.2 overs during their presence and held the innings together. But England kept taking crucial wickets.

After playing quite nicely all the time, Ashwin lost his wicket to an awful shot, driving a fuller length straight to root at Extra cover. Saha followed him immediately, lobbing a simple return catch to Rashid. Suddenly the door had opened up for the English side. With 10 overs remaining and only four wickets to win the game could have went on to favour of the visitors. But, thankfully Jadeja hung in with his confident skipper and held the fort with an unbeaten 40 runs stand to ensure that they did not give a positive result to the visitors in the series opener.

England batting can be summarised briefly despite the fact that they batting close to two full sessions. Alastair Cook scored his fifth Test century in India, the most by a visiting batsman, and Haseeb Hameed missed on deserved century by 18 runs and was dismissed for 82. There was no sense of urgency and the duo calmly moved ahead, executing a smart plan to challenge the Indian batting order later on in the day.

Criticising the pitch alone would be illogical. For the ones who love numbers, this might be a bitter fact that both the teams missed 11 chances throughout the course of play in the last five days. In an age when even a couple of missed chances are criticised, there were close to a dozen of opportunities which were squandered in this match. This surely isn’t a great takeaway for both the teams going into the Vishakhapatnam Test.

Brief Score:

England: 537 (Ben Stokes 128; Ravindra Jadeja 3/86) & 114/0 (Hameed 62*)

India: 488 (Murali Vijay 128; Adil Rashid 4/114) & 172/6 (Virat Kohli 42*; Adil Rashid 3/64)

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