ODI WC: India Thrash England
Linus tackles things head-on. He takes sides in his analysis and it fits excellently with our editorial policy. No 'maybe's' and 'allegedly' for him, only things in black and white.
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By Linus Garg
First publised on 2023-10-30 06:29:27
About the Author
Linus tackles things head-on. He takes sides in his analysis and it fits excellently with our editorial policy. No 'maybe's' and 'allegedly' for him, only things in black and white.
View all posts by this Author
There were murmurs about the condition of the pitch a day ahead of the India-England match in Lucknow. The Ekana stadium curator and the groundstaff had reportedly faced the heat from the Indian team management. But as the match unfolded, it showed that despite the pitch, this Indian team has gained an aura of invincibility due to two reasons - the exemplary form of its bowling unit and the fact that when batting, someone or the other gets into the groove to allow the team to put up a fighting total which gives the bowlers something reasonable to defend.
On Sunday, put in to bat by England, the Indians faced a top order failure mainly due to disciplined bowling by the Englishmen. There were too many dot balls that frustrated the Indian batters into playing shots that did not go the distance. Virat Kolhi was kept quiet for 8 balls after which Willey bowled a slower one which did not come on to the bat. Kohli played a shot that ballooned into the hands of Ben Stokes at cover. Before that, Shubman Gill left a gap between his bat and pad while misreading the line of a perfect delivery from Woakes to be comprehensively bowled. At the other end, Rohit Sharma was batting as if he was playing on a different pitch. He later got good support from K L Rahul and Suryakumar Yadav to allow India to post 229. The score was considered to be a fighting one.
But the way the Indian bowlers, especially Jasprit Bumrah in the beginning and Md Shami later on, bowled, England were never in the game after they lost 4 wickets for just 39 runs. All their top batters were back in the pavilion and the Indian spinners had not bowled yet. Bumrah (3 for 32) and Shami (4 for 22) did most of the damage. When Kuldeep Yadav was introduced, he bowled a peach of e delivery which turned a yard to clean up Jos Buttler and it was all over for England.
With this win, India once again reached the top of the table with an all-win record. The Englishmen, on the other hand, have now lost 5 of their 6 matches and are languishing at the bottom of the table with little hope of reaching the semifinals.
