It’s not often that, without sustained interruption from the weather, matches have gone the distance in recent times. This series has been markedly different.
Despite no more than a marginal part played by the elements, two of the three Tests have spilled over to the final session of the last day, the other ended after tea was extended with England nine down on Day Five.
It’s a development few would have expected when ’s India arrived last month with oodles of inexperience in their kitbag. Several of the top-order batters hadn’t played a Test in England previously; among the bowlers, only Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Siraj, Ravindra Jadeja, Shardul Thakur and Kuldeep Yadav (one outing) had had taste of Test cricket in this land. There were apprehensions that following the retirements of Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma and R Ashwin, India would wipe the floor. But Gill’s warriors have acquitted themselves with credit, competing with the hosts on an equal footing and unlucky to find themselves 1-2 down.
Akash Deep out due to injury
The collective courage and spirit of a team that has played above itself will be put through the sternest examination yet at Old Trafford when the fourth Test gets underway on Wednesday. A bouquet of injuries has swept through the Indian camp since their 22-run loss at Lord’s last Monday. Nitish Kumar Reddy is out of the series with a knee injury, while Akash Deep (groin) and (left hand) are unavailable for this Test. Given that Nitish and Deep have played influential roles, they will be bad misses but as the cliché goes, one individual’s misfortune is another’s
opportunity.
Whether that opportunity comes the way of the uncapped 24-year-old pacer will become obvious on match morning. Kamboj joined the team a couple of days back as cover and is in a straight fight with Prasidh Krishna, who played the first two Tests, for the third pacer’s slot behind the peerless Jasprit Bumrah and the indefatigable Mohammed Siraj. Prasidh’s short-ball barrage that produced boundaries by the bushel in Birmingham has been held against him though all he was doing was following team orders. If he does miss out, he has reason to feel hard done by, but that’s not to say that the young man from Haryana with the propensity to hit the deck does not deserve his place in the XI.
Rain may affect tie
The replacement for Nitish seems to be a toss-up between like-for-like all-rounder Shardul Thakur and left-hand batter Sai Sudharsan, dropped after scores of 0 and 30 on debut at Headingley. The weather could have a say in this call; it has rained almost every day for the last week and though the forecast brings gladder tidings, one can’t disregard the strong link between Manchester and rain.
The onus is on India to do the running because they are the ones playing catch-up, though England won’t sit back and try to defend their lead. The quality of cricket has been consistently high, embellished by the presence in the respective sides of Bumrah and Jofra Archer. More of the same could be in the offing over the next five days.