India vs England: Miracle in London 2.0 for Kohli’s comeback kings
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What is it about this Indian team? One miracle after another. Two times in three India vs England Test matches, Virat Kohli and his cornered tigers have pulled off the Houdini act. Day 5 of the Oval Test match started with England requiring 291 runs, India pursuing 10 wickets and the game seeking ignition. Half an hour after lunch and the blue touch paper was truly lit – the game was in combustion mode.
The mood in the crowd had definitively changed. All the songs of “Hey Root” to the tune of “Hey Jude” had given way to buoyant bursts of passionate yelling from the always generously congregated Indian contingent in the stands. Four wickets in a flash post lunch meant that England had already submitted hopes of victory. India was haring towards yet another London triumph and there was an unmissably familiar spring in the steps of the Indian players.
From 191 all out and trailing by 99 runs to taking a momentary advantage before once again wondering where the next wicket would come from to picking four wickets within 40 minutes – within the space of three days, India had moved to and fro between advantage and major crisis to the verge of another curiously idiosyncratic comeback.
India vs England – Virat Kohli and mentality monsters
There is something about this Indian team, a streak of streetfighter dosed with obvious skill that takes to become an international sportsman. Just enough of the former to deal with adversity distinctly in the mind first and then execute the skill well enough to make improbable comebacks look commonplace.
Captain Kohli had dismissively pointed out the ability of this Indian team to fight out of corners. It is a quality specific to Kohli and like all great teams, this Indian team is moulded on the characteristics of the captain himself.
There is a unique one versus all template to how this team operates. They must almost always first be doubted and questioned. It is necessary for them to pick a fight or be in a crisis. Akin to Steve Waugh when he came out to bat – another captain of an irrevocably great team. And then use that fire to bring out the mentality monster that resides within to keep throwing punches one after another. Knockout blows all of them.
And when that wave of adrenaline is ushered in to ride upon, there is very little the opponent can do. It sometimes actually feels India’s greatest adversaries are they themselves by how utterly redundant the opposition can tend to feel in these phases of play.
India vs England – fire from Bumrah
There are very few teams in the history of sport that can claim ownership of that eventuality. India can do it as a team and also possess individuals who can tear through at will. Jasprit Bumrah is one such cricketer. When he is purring, the pacer can quickly render the competitor a mere prop.
In the hour following lunch on day 5, Bumrah brandished an unplayable barrage of reverse swinging beauties to throw the game wide open. The first one cleaned first innings hero Ollie Pope up, making him look a bit foolish for no foolery of his. Bumrah jagged one from length to dismantle Pope’s defence and the middle stump. If non living objects could feel, the Oval pitch itself would have been shocked knowing that the magic ball was conjured on its surface.
The next one, to dismiss a completely flummoxed Jonny Bairstow was even more artistic, albeit with lesser contribution from the sedate pitch. A Bumrah trade mark that snuck under the English wicketkeeper’s bat at searing pace with movement in the air reminding the onlooker of a rosier era of fast bowling while still en route to the stumps.
Bumrah could have scalped one more, if not two, had it not been for the toe end of Test cricketer of the Year elect Joe Root’s rear guard acting bat. It was a spell for the ages from Bumrah. With an old ball on an absolutely somber pitch, the pacer’s spell – full of Yorkers, bouncers, reverse swing and fire – was as good as any in such conditions.
India vs England – fight from Shardul
The party, however, was started by Shardul Thakur. There is perhaps none better than Shardul who embodies Kohli’s words and exemplifies how this team wants to play cricket. In his fledgling Test career, Shardul has already played three defining Test innings from number 8 while simultaneously contributing with his primary skill.
In his very first over of the fourth innings, Shardul had belatedly extracted life from the Oval pitch when he sent Rory Burns back with a ball that swung just enough to catch the openers edge moments after he had notched up his half century. He then followed it up, with the new ball due, by castling the incomparable Root and effectively finishing off a brief English resistance.
Earlier in the game, Shardul had twice bailed India out of trouble with his batting displaying fire first, and ice later. In the first innings, Shardul’s fastest ever fifty in Test history on English soil, glittered with proper cricketing shots, had pulled India from a collapse to a fighting 191. In the second innings, with quick wickets of Ravindra Jadeja, vice captain Ajinkya Rahane and captain Kohli falling, he outscored Rishabh Pant in a partnership of over 100 runs to take India to psychological safety.
Cricket is easy for Shardul Thakur. He turns up, tonks bowlers, picks wickets and goes back to his hotel room.
India vs England – ice from Rohit
And in this euphoria, one must also add a generous sprinkling of gratitude to Rohit Sharma. The Indian opener showed remarkable restraint and mental fortitude to hold back his natural game in order to set up the game with a fine hundred.
It was Rohit’s long awaited maiden overseas century, one filled with rich context that entails the dream of three generations of the Sharma family. It was a sight for the sore eyes of every purist that had seen batsmen submit to the swing in English conditions. And a template followed by Rishabh Pant later on day 4 of the Test match to return with a first half-century of this series.
Returning English opener Haseeb Hameed also followed a similar style until two moments of indecision on either side of lunch changed the game. Just prior to lunch, Hameed – perhaps realising a need to press the play button on a largely pause session for England – tapped Jadeja to the offside and set off for a non existent single which ended in a scrambling and desperately diving Dawid Malan short of his crease. And post lunch, moving away from padding Jadeja’s around the wicket deliveries away, he left his stumps exposed in an attempted forward defence and sent the Test match India’s way.
That perhaps, better than Rohit’s innings itself, encapsulated the beauty of the 34-year-old’s effort wherein he managed to find the right mix of cavalry within the caution in the face of adversity. And as though paying poetic tribute to Rohit Sharma’s tweet “Sun will rise again tomorrow” in 2018 after being dropped from the India vs England series which the visitors eventually lost 4-1, the sun was out in full glory at Oval to watch two simultaneous salvations.
The formalities would be completed by Umesh Yadav post tea and as James Anderson unsuccessfully reviewed delaying the inevitable end, festive Indians unfurled multiple tricolors stretching across the isles of the Oval with firm knowledge that history now beckons for Kohli’s comeback kings!
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Arinjay Ghosh
(77 Articles Published)