The 3rd day’s play at the Test in Rose Bowl Southampton began on a somber note, with both the teams lining up just outside the pavilion to mark the hundred years of the commencement of the brutal World War 1 with a respectful minute’s silence. The first World War 1 or the “Great War cost the world millions of lives, in a period lasting for four years. Just as England, India too had suffered great loss in the World War 1 as hundreds of thousands of Indian soldiers had enlisted to fight for the Allied forces. The war had a disastrous effect on cricket as well, as competitive cricket was effectively stopped with cricketers being enlisted as soldiers and officers for their respective armies. 289 first-class cricketers were killed in battle during the war, including 4 Test players, of who the most celebrated was Colin Blythe – the England spinner who died of his wounds at Passchendaele in 1917. Blythe was represented at the ceremony in Rose Bowl by his descendants.
Now, back to the cricket! India had lost the wicket of opener Shikhar Dhawan overnight in reply to England’s mammoth first innings score of 569 for 7. An early Shikhar Dhawan wicket has become a regular feature of all Indian innings, and the Indian team management would be seriously worried about their swashbuckling opener’s poor form. Cheteshwar Pujara and Murali Vijay soldiered on, and were going well till Pujara nicked Stuart Broad to give the new England wicketkeeper Jos Buttler his first catch in Test cricket, which the young man celebrated widely. Vijay didn’t last much longer either, dragging on a sharp rising delivery from Stuart Broad to his stumps. While Vijay’s dismissal may be excused as he has already played well in this series, getting a couple of significant scores, India’s best batsman Cheteshwar Pujara would be worried about getting out consistently after having got his eye in and having settled down. Usually Pujara goes on to make big hundreds after spending his time at the crease, but here in England, he has failed to do that.
India’s other important batsman, Virat Kohli has performed even worse in this series, and he looked desperate to get a big score yesterday. Kohli batted with great care and was very defensive minded throughout his innings before edging James Anderson to captain Alastair Cook. He had made his highest score of the Investec Test series so far, making 39 off 75 balls, scoring 3 boundaries, and was dejected at getting out again before making any sort of impact. Kohli takes great pride in contributing to the team effort and he would be very disappointed with his abject form in this series.
Ajinkya Rahane and Rohit Sharma batted well together, and both looked highly capable against England’s seam bowlers. But Rohit Sharma gave it away with a ridiculous shot off Moeen Ali, which went straight into the hands of Stuart Broad, who was standing at mid-off. Rahane soon followed, losing his wicket to the supposedly harmless spin of Moeen Ali, trying to hit him out of the ground, only to see it taken easily at mid-on by the substitute fielder Sam Terry.
That brought captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni and Ravindra Jadeja to the crease and both played beautifully, with Jadeja in particular playing very aggressively, especially against his nemesis, James Anderson. But Anderson had the last laugh, trapping Jadeja leg before for a quick 31. One of the biggest talking points of this series has to be the long running battle between Anderson and Jadeja, both on the field and off it, and Anderson won this round of the boxing match.
Bhuvneshwar Kumar came in, played a few attacking shots, before getting out to Broad. Dhoni was still unbeaten on a fifty at the end of the day’s play, still holding his ground. India had reached 323 for the loss of 8 wickets, and are 246 runs behind as we move on to what promises to be an exciting fourth day’s play at Rose Bowl later today.
