India Demolish England In The Second Test
Holding an extreme view and carting the ball out of the park is what interests him most. He is a hard hitter at all times. Fasten your seatbelts and read.
View all posts by this Author
By Slogger
First publised on 2021-02-17 05:40:47
About the Author
Holding an extreme view and carting the ball out of the park is what interests him most. He is a hard hitter at all times. Fasten your seatbelts and read.
View all posts by this Author
The controversies do not matter. The outstanding performances and a great victory do. India beat England by 317 runs in the second Test at Chennai, outplaying the visitors in all departments of the game in yet another stunning turnaround after they were comprehensively beaten by the same side by 227 runs in the first Test.
The Test was marred by controversies - several ex-cricketers from England, Michael Vaughan in particular - criticized the pitch and called it sub-standard and not a 5-day Test pitch. Then there were several umpiring decisions that came under the scanner, both from on-field umpires and the third umpire. Yet, none of these could take anything away from the splendid performance put in by the India team.
The toss did matter, as it did in the first Test. This time India won in and promptly elected to bat. The pitch was difficult to bat on for everyone except Rohit Sharma. Displaying an amazing array of strokes and proving once again that on his day, he is the most difficult batsman to bowl to, Sharma struck 161 quality runs which took the game away from England. By the time India finished at 329, the pitch was already doing 'things' that made it clear that English batsmen would be sitting ducks for R Ashwin, Axar Patel (making his debut in Tests) and Kuldeep Yadav, the three spinners in the Indian side.
England could manage only 134 in their first essay, just about managing to avoid the follow-on. None of the batsmen had answers to the probing spin bowling by Indian spinners, especially Ashwin who took a five-wicket haul, on a friendly pitch. When India batted for the second time, the English spinners too spun a web, but Man-of-the-Match R Ashwin produced a master class and showed the world that he can not only bowl well on a spinning pitch but bat also. He struck a priceless century to take India to 286. Virat Kolhi was also looking good for a century before he was dismissed in the 70s. India set England 482 to win with more than two days remaining in the match.
But the England second innings was a repeat of their first. This time, Axar Patel caused the maximum damage with a fiver on his Test debut, with Ashwin chipping in with three wickets and Yadav getting two. It was total capitulation on England's part on a pitch where Ashwin had scored a superlative century. The pitch was same for both the sides. The fact is that India made good use of the conditions and England did not. They also made a tactical error in team selection by not adding another spinner in the team. Well done India, now go for the series win.
