Indian skipper hinted that India are “most likely” to retain their four pacers and one spin all-rounder combination for the second Test of the five-match series against England, starting Thursday.
Tweaking their balance for the first Test in Trent Bridge, India separated the spin duo of Ravindra Jadeja and Ravichandran Ashwin, dropping the latter to bring in the extra seamer in Shardul Thakur.
And though Thakur didn’t contribute with the bat, he took four important wickets. The pacer provided fine support to India’s three main quicks Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Shami and Mohammed Siraj, who played ahead of an injured Ishant Sharma.
“Most likely it will be a template going ahead in the series, but again, adaptability has been a strength of ours as well. This looks like the right template for us moving forward,”
Kohli was quoted as saying by ESPNcricinfo.
While India were painfully denied the opportunity to chase down a further 157 runs with 9 wickets in hand by a complete washout on Day 5, they could still look back with pleasure at some of the positives that came out of the game.
One of those was a much-improved effort with the bat from the lower-order where Shami, Bumrah and Siraj added 46 runs to stretch their team’s first-innings lead to an impressive 95 in difficult conditions.
With runs from tail arguably making the biggest difference on India’s last trip to England in 2018, Kohli looked pleased with what he saw from his bowlers at their secondary skill and said runs.
“It’s a hard work of three-odd weeks now. They have been in the nets regularly, wanting to contribute regularly, wanting to contribute to the team.
Getting 50-plus runs from those three bowlers was like gold dust for us – we would have been talking about a lead of 40-odd and then we got to a lead of 95 purely because of their efforts.
Just the grit and determination… you know, as opposition, when the bowlers gets runs it can be annoying.”
said Kohli.
Chasing 209, India had wiped out 52 runs of those already at the cost of just 1 wicket and had an in-form Rohit Sharma and Cheteshwar Pujara not out overnight. Kohli said the intent with which India batted late on Day 4 was a testament to the fact that they were going to have a real crack at the target if the rain had relented and allowed even two sessions of play.
“We were expecting rain on day three and four, but it chooses to arrive on day five. We thought we were in a good position to have a crack at the target. This is exactly what we wanted to do: we wanted to start strong,”
the Indian captain said.
“Heading to day five, we had our chances right in front of us. One good partnership and then you know what happens when there’s only 150 on the board to defend. We certainly felt like we are on top of the game,”
he added.
Had India gone on to win, it would’ve been only the second instance of them chasing a 100+ target successfully outside Asia since the famous Adelaide Test of 2003. The other being the historic breach of the fortress ‘Gabba’ earlier in the year.
A draw in Nottingham keeps the series scoreline 0-0 ahead of the second Test but gives the two teams four points each towards the new cycle of the World Test Championship.
