Birmingham: Pacer Ishant Sharma (5/51) ran through the middle order but Sam Curran’s fighting 63 (65b, 9×4, 2×6) helped England set India a tricky 194-run target in the first cricket Test, here Friday at Edgbaston.
Ishant took his eighth fifer while Ravi Ashwin (3/59) and Umesh Yadav (2/20) shared the other five wickets as England were bowled out for 180 at the stroke of tea.
India had England on mat at one stage as they had reduced England to 87 for seven but 20-year-old all-rounder Curran took the centre stage to script a fightback of sorts. In doing so, he put on 48 runs with Adil Rashid (16) for the eighth wicket. It was the only passage of play on this third day wherein English batsmen looked comfortable at the crease as Indian bowlers searched desperately for a breakthrough.
Their partnership looked good for many more, but a heavy cloud stopped play for approximately 16 minutes as bad light forced the players in. No rain came, and shortly on resumption, Umesh cleaned up Rashid’s off-stump in the 45th over. Sensing closure of the innings, Curran attacked the bowling, hitting sixes off both Sharma and Ashwin, as he reached his maiden Test half century at a run-a-ball gallop.
He shielded both senior partners Stuart Broad (11) and James Anderson (0) ably, but Sharma eventually broke through as the English innings came to an end.
This was after Ashwin ran through the top order. Starting from their overnight score of nine for one, England did not get much respite as Ashwin bowled non-stop from one end. Keaton Jennings (8) was the first to go with KL Rahul taking a sharp catch at leg slip.
Joe Root (14) held the key to England’s second innings, and eventual course of the game, but Ashwin etched out the big wicket eight overs later. He broke the budding 21-run partnership between Root and Dawid Malan (20) as Rahul held another excellent, low catch at leg slip to end the England captain’s vigil.
It could have gotten worse, as Jonny Bairstow’s (28) first shot also landed close to Rahul’s hand. Three overs later, Malan (on 17) got a life when Shikhar Dhawan failed to latch on to a low catch at first slip off Sharma. But the left-hander never looked comfortable at the crease with Sharma constantly troubling him.
Just before lunch Sharma got reward for his persistence. Rahane caught Malan at fourth slip in the 27th over. Then in the last over before lunch, Sharma struck twice to dismiss Bairstow, caught at first slip, and Ben Stokes (6), caught at third slip, in the space of three balls.
