England have gained control of the second Test match at Lord’s after they picked up six wickets and conceded just 181 runs on day four. Cheteshwar Pujara and Ajinkya Rahane shared a resilient 100-run stand, but Mark Wood and Moeen Ali shared five wickets between them to put England ahead.
Right from the start of the day, England showed they were in control of the game and never let India off the hook. Even when Cheteshwar Pujara and Ajinkya Rahane got that century stand, England were never out of the game as they kept the lid on the scoring rate and did not allow the game to drift. And when the opportunity came, they struck and nudged ahead in the game.
The Indian openers had their first real failure in this series. KL Rahul and Rohit Sharma started off cautiously, letting go of balls outside off-stump and tried to settle in before the long haul. However, Joe Root changed things up. Mark Wood was brought on in just the sixth over, and he started cranking up proper pace.
In the 10th over, he got the first breakthrough for England as he had Rahul nicking off. In his very next over, he bounced Rohit out. The latter pulled Wood for a six off the third delivery before Rohit fell into the trap with three fielders deep on the leg-side for the pull/hook. India were reduced to 27/2 (effectively 0/2).
Indian captain Virat Kohli strode out and looked in good touch. He hit a couple of fluent cover drives, which went to the boundary. There were a couple of play and misses, but he looked confident before Sam Curran had him fishing well outside off-stump and nicked one to Jos Buttler. Kohli (20) fell a couple of overs before lunch, and India’s score read 55/3.
With Pujara and Rahane also out of form and a long tail to come, England may have well fancied their chances of running through this Indian batting line-up. However, the two senior batters stood tall. In the post-Lunch session, they grinded it out. The runs didn’t come, but they ensured no wickets fell either. India scored just 49 runs in the second session as the Pujara-Rahane pair battled it out.
After Tea, Rahane did try to keep the scoreboard ticking and notched up a hard-fought half-century. Pujara was defiant at the other end and had faced in excess of 200 balls. But just before the second new-ball, India had a mini-collapse, which almost undid all the hard work.
Wood got one to kick off from a length that took Pujara’s edge. Rahane, who looked a touch iffy against Moeen Ali, fell to the off-spinner itself as he was caught behind. Meanwhile, Ravindra Jadeja was bowled by a jaffa as the ball turned significantly to hit the left-hander’s off-stump.
Rishabh Pant and Ishant Sharma saw off the last few overs before bad light interrupted came in and forced the umpires to call off the day. The light was fading, and that forced England to bowl only the spinners. However, when they wanted to take the second new-ball, the umpires denied due to the fading light and hence, it was stumps.
With a lead of just 154, India are behind in the game. Moreover, their tail isn’t the best, and Pant is going to be the absolute key. England will fancy their chances of skittling India out cheaply on day five before hunting down the target. They are bossing this game at the moment.
Brief Scores
India 364 (Rahul 129, Rohit 83, Anderson 5/62, Robinson 2/73) & 181/6 (Rahane 61, Pujara 46, Wood 3/40, Ali 2/52) lead England 391 (Root 180*, Bairstow 57, Siraj 4/94, Ishant 3/69) by 154 runs.
