KL Rahul, Ravindra Jadeja half-centuries power India to big lead against England in 1st Test at Trent Bridge

India’s lower-order continued to impress, on the third day of the opening Test match against England at Trent Bridge, not with the ball but with the bat, which gave their side bragging rights on yet another rain-truncated day. On a day where only 49.2 overs were bowled, India stretched their first-innings lead to an overall 95 runs to which England were 21/0 in their reply in the second essay.

India recovered from a horrible batting performance on the second day where they were left tottering at 125/4 from a position of 97/0, having lost the likes of Virat Kohli (0), Cheteshwar Pujara (4) and Ajinkya Rahane (5) for a grand total of 9 runs between the best batsmen, and Rohit Sharma contributing with 36 before the collapse.

The matters became even worse for the visiting side early on the third day when they slipped to 145/5 having lost Rishabh Pant for 25 and yet in trail of the English first innings’ total of 183. But at No 7, Ravindra Jadeja produced one of his best batting displays in testing and challenging conditions, scoring 56 from 86 balls with the help of 8 fours and a six, which also held the lower order together.

The Indian tail is not known to wag for a long time in Test matches but on Friday it did and did it in style. The bottom five of India’s batting line-up not only kept England out of the park for a long duration which added more to their frustration, but they added as many as 133 runs — far more than their top five put together — to keep India ahead in the contest.

KL Rahul was the standout performer from the top-order for India as he missed his century on come back to the Test side by a margin of 16 runs. Rahul dropped anchor while the other end had batsmen falling on regular intervals. Having earlier added 97 runs for the opening wicket with Rohit, Rahul went on to add another crucial 60 runs for the sixth wicket with Jadeja. 

But when it was looking like he was set for his century, James Anderson snapped his wicket, getting him caught behind by Jos Buttler to go past former India captain and legendary spinner Anil Kumble in the list of most wicket takers in Test cricket history. 

Anderson is now overall third in the list behind two legendary spinners, Sri Lanka’s Muttiah Muralitharan (800) and Australia’s Shane Warne (708). 

Shardul Thakur followed KL Rahul into the pavilion soon after and it looked like India’s innings will see a rapid end. But the likes of Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Shami along with Mohammed Siraj ensured there was further pressure on the English side, as they all went on to put crucial partnerships towards the end while India ended their first innings at the total of 278.

After Jadeja and Shami added 27 runs from 25 balls, Bumrah and Shami paid up to and another 13. While Shami did not look to attack and rather resorted to solid front-foot and back-foot defence, it was Bumrah who went on to have some fun at the expense of the English bowlers. 

Connecting with the ball from the middle of his bat, Bumrah smacked three boundaries and one hit over the fence to make his highest score of 28, while adding 33 runs with Siraj for the 11th wicket.

India’s brave batting performance throughout the day gave them a lead of 95 runs in the first innings which will be vital for them in order to apply pressure on this brittle English batting lineup provided weather favours the visitors.

The third day ended up losing 40 overs or so to inclement weather and the forecast for the fourth as well as the final day, on which India are left with 190 odd overs also to force a result, also does not look very promising.