Inclement weather halted India’s march towards a vital 1-0 lead in the five-match Test series for the Pataudi Trophy, in the first Test played at the Trent Bridge ground in Nottingham, with the fifth and final day on Sunday being washed out that forced a disappointing draw in what would have been a thrilling finish.
India were comfortably placed at 52/1 chasing 209 for victory and needed another 157 runs, and had poor weather stayed away from the venue and allowed a complete day’s play to take place like it did on the fourth day — Saturday — of the contest, the visitors stood a strong chance to record a win while chasing.
That said, it was known that the last two days of the match would be impacted by rains, it had remained bright and sunny on Saturday while not a single ball was possible to be bowled on Sunday.
The Indian cricket team would be a more disappointed lot after the conclusion of the first test given that they stood a strong chance of taking a lead in the series and beating England in their own backyard, which has not been a common occurrence for them in test cricket in recent years.
On the other hand, England will be certainly pleased that they got away from what would have been a possible second defeat on the trot in as many Tests for them, having lost the second and final test match to New Zealand earlier this year.
Joe Root was the hero of the match for England and he was righteously adjudged the man of the match for his splendid performance with the bat and the way he marshalled his troops in the contest. The England captain scored 64 in the first innings and followed it up with a brilliant 109 in the second, which not only helped England wipe the deficit of 95 runs while batting second, also help them to reach a respectable total of 303 in the second innings which set India a target of 209 runs to win.
The Indian fast bowler should certainly take a lot of hard out of this contest given that they were absolutely dominating and never really allowed England batsmen to settle down in their own pitches. Barring Root, who has been a perennial thorn in India’s flesh, the other batsmen were just too ordinary against relentless Indian bowling attack led by the likes of Jasprit Bumrah Mohammed Shami who both were brilliant along with the support from Mohammed Siraj and Shardul Thakur.
The Trent Bridge test also marked a successful return to the test side for KL Rahul, who was away from the conventional format owing to a poor run of scores. Rahul was set up higher in the order, as a new partner for Rohit Sharma at the top and he did not disappoint.
In the first innings, Rahul kept all his aggressive instant and stroke-making ability to make a superb 84, and followed it up with a brilliant 26 from 38 balls laced with six boundaries but also showed his ability to shift gears against a quality attack in red ball cricket.
India will also be happy with the way Bumrah went about his job in both innings of the ball, and his contribution of 28 runs with the bat which India captain Virat Kohli termed as gold dust was indeed a fact to remember. Bumrah took a superb five-wicket haul in the second innings after terrorising English batsmen in the first, to mark a successful start to the series in which his team is being touted as a deserving winner.
Devarchit Varma is a cricket writer and journalist with an experience of more than a decade, having worked at Hindustan Times (newspaper) and CricketCountry (website). Along with covering international and domestic cricket, he has also interviewed several current and former top players such as Rohit Sharma, Steve Smith, Dale Steyn, Michael Hussey, Jacques Kallis, Brendon McCullum, Shane Watson, Lasith Malinga and many more. He has also worked in other beats as a journalist in Bollywood (Reliance BigOye) and IT (SiliconIndia) industries.
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