Incredible fightback from India on final day
The second Test match between England and India was at its exciting best. While tailenders out England under immense pressure by scoring runs, bowlers on the other hand made sure that hosts’ chances of winning the match at Lord’s are negligible.
With only two results possible in the final session, Indian bowlers bowled to heart out to bowl out England and win the match for their team to go 0-1 up in the five-Test series.
India made history on Monday as they beat England by 151 runs in the second Test to
triumph at the Lord’s Cricket Ground after seven years in red-ball cricket. Mohammed Siraj, Jasprit Bumrah, Ishant Sharma and Mohammed Shami swung the match in India’s favour on the final day to help the visitors register only their third Test win at the Home of Cricket and first after the famous 2014 triumph under MS Dhoni.
England would have been confident of pushing for a win at the start of the day’s play when India resumed their second innings at 181 for 6 with a lead of 158 runs and they even made the perfect start as Ollie Robinson got rid of the overnight batsman Rishabh Pant (22) and Ishant (16) in quick succession to leave India tottering at 209 for 8 in the first half-hour of play.
But that’s when the match completely changed and India stormed back in to the contest with a record 9th-wicket partnership between Shami and Bumrah, which effectively took out the possibility of an unlikely English victory.
Shami and Bumrah stunned the English fast bowlers with their batting technique as both tail-enders applied themselves perfectly in tough conditions and against a newish Dukes ball.
They took India’s score from 209 to 294 for 8 by Lunch with Shami having brought up his second Test half-century. He hit a four off James Anderson right after play began and that’s when Kohli decided to declare the innings in the middle of the 110th over with India reached 298 for 8.
Shami remained unbeaten on his best-ever Test score of 56 while Bumrah remained not out on 34 as India set England a target of 272 runs to win thanks to their highest 9th-wicket partnership against England in the United Kingdom.
