England tour of India

[meninblue]

England are doing it as per template so far.

Win the toss, bat first. Score a big first innings total like 500-600 and take a lead. The use two spinners on the fourth day and fifth day spin friendly wicket.

India needs to restrict England till 450 to fight back. If you field for more than one and half day in Chennai conditions then it becomes incredibly difficult to bat longer during batting innings.

Good win for England. Executed the simple plan very well.

Once you lose toss in India and allow opponents to score 500+ in first innings then it becomes severely tough to fightback unless opponents play very poorly

[alfie]

Hell of a win in the end. Of course, winning the toss looks to have been of tremendous importance considering the pitch on day 1 and 2 really had nowt in for the bowlers, but England still went out and scored the runs they need to dominate the game afterwards.

Wonder what deck India will serve up for round 2. They wont want a lottery toss again.

Probably going to be a little bit difficult to produce anything markedly different for an adjacent wicket ..they only have three days. They may indeed want to have something a little more responsive for bowling from the start but you can't really change the basic nature of a pitch overnight so if they try to have it spin more from the off it may only result in a game in which scores are lower but batting first remains a big advantage...

I'm certainly not expecting a bouncy green strip

Kohli apparently wasn't happy with the ball used in this game. Certainly looked pretty ragged in some of the close ups I saw in the latter parts of both first innings ; but I'm not sure there is much they can do about this at short notice either ?

[Durhamfootman]

Kohli apparently wasn't happy with the ball used in this game. Certainly looked pretty ragged in some of the close ups I saw in the latter parts of both first innings ; but I'm not sure there is much they can do about this at short notice either ?

a piece about the new SG ball

https://indianexpress.com/article/expla ... l-7174199/

Talk is of a harder ball with a more prominent seam, but that seam looked extremely raggy at times..... certainly the first ball used in the match looked as though it needed a trim quite quickly. Been working on this new ball for 18 months seemingly

[sussexpob]

certainly the first ball used in the match looked as though it needed a trim quite quickly

One of the more memorable moments of this test will be Nick Knight's observation that Kohli would no doubt be absolutely delighted the ball had gone soft, while the camera showed the aforementioned Indian captain pleading with the umpires for the 20th over in a row that the ball needed to be changed ASAP. Knight once again with his finger right on the pulse of the action.

The ball by about the 40th over started to resemble something you'd find in the burning embers of a house fire. It appeared, solely on my own view from the TV angles shown, that the seam had completely broken all over the ball in the England first innings, and very early on.

Not sure the umpires are able to change the ball for that reason though. The only test for the ball is if it looses its roundness, they have those metal rings in their pocket to test that.

[Durhamfootman]

I have seen umpires take out a pair of scissors and snip off loose bits of the seam before. That first ball might have opened like an easter egg if they'd done that though

[sussexpob]

As regards to the ball, the real thing that stands out is the total lack of reverse swing for Bumrah, while Anderson in the last innings had the ball moving around like a rag in the wind after only 20 overs. Bumrah has actually complained a fair bit since the new Covid non-saliva rules came into play that the ball just doesnt reverse, and advocated some artificial replacement be put in place to even the contest up. He has also said they had tested using excessive sweat to treat the ball but it had no effect on the ball. He repeated these comments after the test yesterday.

While I guess many people will just accept that Jimmy Anderson is one of the greatest swingers of all time and just extracted more quality from the ball, but Bumrah's unqiue action is pretty much built for reverse swing, and in identical conditions it doesnt make a great deal of sense how he got nothing while Anderson got it going all over.

I think its fair to state that Bumrah imparts more backspin on the ball than any pace bowler ever, hence he gets that spinner like lift and dip in the air that is his unique calling card. When reversing the ball, that backspin will create gyroscopic inertia that stabilizes the seam upright (as is required to reverse) and creates a lot of turbulence. He bowls much quicker than Anderson too, which is a big factor in how the ball should reverse (in fact, most scientists seem to indicate that its virtually impossible to reverse swing it at Anderson's pace, it only starts around 80mph and the likelyhood increases up the pace scale). From a scientific level, Bumrah should be the one moving the ball all over. He does it regularly, both conventionally and reversing, so its not like we dont know he can bowl prodigious swing.

I wonder how England managed to reverse. Considering the acute differences in results, one might be inclined to view it suspiciously. Maybe India got a complete dud ball....

[sussexpob]

I'm certainly not expecting a bouncy green strip

The curator who produced the pitch did. He claimed the wicket in the build up would resemble something more akin to English conditions, but judging on what came out, he maybe has only watched games in Somerset in the last decade. Side note, the curator has never even produced a FC wicket for a game before, so being the first person to ever produce two simultaneous wickets for back to back tests at the same venue may have not been a great choice. Judging on his comments, he predicted a good grass covering due to the dual pitch development requirement (couldnt tell you the link or why)... the comments are interesting, but sometimes when you get groundsman claim live grass on a pitch, it often dies very quickly (especially in hotter weather) and the dead matter has a numbing effect on bounce and pace initially, while also holding the pitch together. Maybe this is what happened, the dead plant matter eventually dries and dusts away, and the pitch falls apart. Seen a lot of tests like that in England in the 2000s. Lords especially did a lot. Tried to leave grass to speed up proceedings and encourage a lively wicket, but in conditions that are hotter it just dies and has the counter effect..... although in England you dont get the same extreme heat to break the wicket up, so many of those Lords games just went on and on.

So you ask, what can be done? I think reading about the Lords wickets in that era, they did their best to remove as much of the dead plant matter as possible, and got better results after realising the mistakes.

[sussexpob]

Generally though, Chennai has been known as a venue with terrible wickets. This is the reason why it hasnt hosted a test since 2016, the pitch India scored 750/6 on was deemed unfit for test matches, and the BCCI havent returned since. It was the last straw after many years of pitches that lost all spice.

Come to think of it, it must have been in Chennai where the old groundman told Dhoni to go get lost in 2012/13. Dhoni wanted a pitch that broke up and produced a result, and coming to the final test he demanded Chennai produce a wicket that bucked the trend of slow, nothing pitches that had draw written over them. The curator responded quite bluntly that Dhoni should stick to batting, and he took orders from no man, not even the BCCI or Captain.

I am not sure if he did it out of spite, but the wicket produced was insanely slow with almost zero bounce. The abiding memory was watching Dhoni and Kohli, two men who would probably walk into a side composed of the World All time limted overs XI, batting at the pace of Mike Atherton trying to save a test match as the series slipped away.

The pitch was so slow, bowlers couldnt take many wickets, but batsman couldnt play any strokes either. So while no one scored anything outrageous like 700 all out, only 4 wickets a day were falling.

So the venue has history for naft draw fests. I have no idea why BCCI picked a venue is scratched off to host two back to back tests.

[meninblue]

Chennai conditions are not at all conducive to produce pace friendly wickets.Even in Ranji trophy mat he's at Chennai, it's always been the same. Spin, slow, low bounce. There is more chance of Afghanistan winning a test match against major nation that Chennai producing a pace friendly wicket. Just not possible with the natural conditions and the soil.

Dharamshala in winter has produced most swing of all. In Mumbai the swing lasts for only 2 - 4 overs with new ball. But atleast bounce at Wankhede is better than that at Chennai.

[Durhamfootman]

Is it able to be more bio secure than others, SP?

Like England choosing test grounds with hotels on site?

I don't know the ground, so I have no idea

Did Bumrah not pick up 2 wickets with reverse swing in the first innings? I think Lawrence was one

from the day one report on crapinfo....'For just under an hour after lunch, Jasprit Bumrah had begun to find reverse swing'

[Slipstream]

As regards to the ball, the real thing that stands out is the total lack of reverse swing for Bumrah, while Anderson in the last innings had the ball moving around like a rag in the wind after only 20 overs. Bumrah has actually complained a fair bit since the new Covid non-saliva rules came into play that the ball just doesnt reverse, and advocated some artificial replacement be put in place to even the contest up. He has also said they had tested using excessive sweat to treat the ball but it had no effect on the ball. He repeated these comments after the test yesterday.

While I guess many people will just accept that Jimmy Anderson is one of the greatest swingers of all time and just extracted more quality from the ball, but Bumrah's unqiue action is pretty much built for reverse swing, and in identical conditions it doesnt make a great deal of sense how he got nothing while Anderson got it going all over.

I think its fair to state that Bumrah imparts more backspin on the ball than any pace bowler ever, hence he gets that spinner like lift and dip in the air that is his unique calling card. When reversing the ball, that backspin will create gyroscopic inertia that stabilizes the seam upright (as is required to reverse) and creates a lot of turbulence. He bowls much quicker than Anderson too, which is a big factor in how the ball should reverse (in fact, most scientists seem to indicate that its virtually impossible to reverse swing it at Anderson's pace, it only starts around 80mph and the likelyhood increases up the pace scale). From a scientific level, Bumrah should be the one moving the ball all over. He does it regularly, both conventionally and reversing, so its not like we dont know he can bowl prodigious swing.

I wonder how England managed to reverse. Considering the acute differences in results, one might be inclined to view it suspiciously. Maybe India got a complete dud ball....

Anderson
"I just got lucky really with a couple that hit some bare patches, and I had a bit of reverse as well".

Having the grass on the new pitch meant the by day 5 it got patchy. Got reverse early in the first innings but the batsmen were able to play it. First innings 4x2x3x2x3x3, short spells aren't enough to get wickets for him. Archer got three 5 over spells. Anderson needs to ask for more overs.

[Durhamfootman]

Archer out of second test with an elbow injury. Olly Stone could come in to the side in the absence of Woody, or I suppose they could play both Broad and Anderson, or even a 3rd spinner if they wanted, although that feels the least likely option

[Arthur Crabtree]

No Woakes?

[Durhamfootman]

I forgot about Woakes

[alfie]

No Woakes?

Woakes the least likely option , I'd imagine. His record in these parts is not the best , and he wouldn't really supply a point of difference if paired with Broad or Anderson. Though he would lengthen the batting , I suppose , which could be a consideration.

This is an unfortunate added selection issue England could have done without. But at least they have options. Hope they pick the right one - or one that works anyway.

Bad luck , bad timing , for Archer. I thought that was the best I've seen him with a red ball since his first series against Australia.