TALKING POINTS
Follow UsLike the pitch in Visakhapatnam, it was a slow day of Test cricket to kick off the second Test. The one who was patient bore rewards. The others perished. You could sense it with a glance at the scorecard. Yashasvi Jaiswal batted the whole day, offering only two half chances, ending the day with his second Test hundred, first at home and his highest individual score as yet - 179*.
However, England would be the happier side at the end of the day’s play. They kept chipping away from the other end. Two wickets in the final hour elevated the wickets column to six. On a pitch where India clearly wanted to post 500 on board, they are now 336/6 with Jaiswal only having Ravichandran Ashwin for company, to be followed by the bowlers. Barring Rajat Patidar, who suffered an unfortunate dismissal on debut, everyone else fell to soft dismissals.
Here are some major talking points from Day 1:
Same story as Hyderabad?
After Jaiswal’s 179, the highest entry on India’s batting card is Shubman Gill’s 34. Everyone else got their eye in and got out, including Rohit Sharma who batted for an hour to score 14 before handing catching practice to Ollie Pope at leg slip. Shreyas Iyer, Axar Patel and KS Bharat were out cutting the ball.
In Tests, this is only the second innings where India's three to six batters are dismissed to a 25+ score without converting a single one to a 50+ score. The other one also came against England in 1990 at Lord's.
After the defeat in the first Test, Rahul Dravid, India’s head coach stated that India left out some runs in the first innings. There, three Indian batters were out in the 80s. In Vizag, four batters in the middle order were dismissed in the 27-34 range. Consequently, despite doing all the hard work, India conceded the advantage and now need Jaiswal to bat long tomorrow as well alongside Ashwin if they want to bat only once. There also lies the risk of getting bundled out under 400.
Jaiswal’s tempo
Yashasvi Jaiswal's tempo during his unbeaten 179 was one of the most heartwarming aspects of Day 1 for the hosts. He was 26 off 65 balls during India’s watchful start. But by the end of the day’s play, he had a strike rate of nearly 70. At no stage in his innings (50-run brackets), the left-hander’s strike rate went under 50.
The trick was, in between, Jaiswal kept scoring boundaries in clusters. In the 30th over, he scored 10 runs off two balls against Shoaib Bashir to reach his half-century before Lunch. In the 45th over, he mustered three consecutive fours against Tom Hartley. It was also a phase where he scored 22 runs within 13 balls. In the 68th over, he has 10 runs against Rehan Ahmed within three deliveries.
The 22-year-old was watchful against Anderson (only 8 runs from 47 balls) but scored at a strike rate of 81.4 against spinners. Facing Hartley and Ahmed, his favorable match-ups turning the ball into him, Jaiswal hammered 82 runs from 84 balls.
Hence, Jaiswal had the perfect tempo, showing judicious aggression, yet sticking to his task of batting a long innings.
Anderson's endurance
Playing the first Test of the 22nd year of his international career, James Anderson left many awestruck with his fitness and consistency. On one of the flattest tracks, Anderson generated 22.9% and 22.2% of false shots in the first and the second sessions, both the highest by any England bowler in those respective sessions.
On top of that, he was the most economical bowler in both sessions - going at 2.4 in the morning session and 1.7 in the afternoon session.
Anderson also pouched Shubman Gill's wicket. He has now dismissed Gill five times, the most by any bowler, averaging only 7.8 runs per wicket. An alarming fact for Gill is that all these five dismissals have come when Anderson has pushed him to defend the ball (both front foot and back foot) around a similar length.
In a series where Gill is playing for his place, Anderson having a wood over him doesn’t bode well for the 24-year-old.
Rohit continues to struggle vs spin
In Tests at home since 2022, Rohit averages 80.5 against pacers (2 dismissals) as compared to 27.6 against spinners (9 dismissals). Against left-arm orthodox spin, Rohit averages 24.8 (five dismissals) and 30 against off-spinners (four dismissals). In Hyderabad, he was out to left-arm spin in both innings. Today (February 2), he became the first Test wicket of the off-spinner Bashir.
Rohit was known to be a better batter against the turning ball in a batting lineup that has struggled to cope with spin for a while. However, his uncanny tendency to find ways to get out against spin is becoming a worrying factor for the Indian team.
