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After five days of toil and plenty of angst about the decision to bowl first, England emerged victorious, reeling in a target of 371 runs in the final session of the match to beat India by five wickets. Headingley had witnessed another entry into its annals of absurdity, as had this impossibly spirited team led by Ben Stokes.
There were a few nerves and setbacks on the final day, moments when this new-look India side summoned up the tamasha and squeezed hard. But at 6.28pm, as Jamie Smith launched Ravindra Jadeja into the stands, a run chase underpinned by Ben Duckett’s sublime 149 was completed and with it a 1-0 lead in this five-match series.
Among the biggest surprises was that Jasprit Bumrah went wicketless on the final day as England – and a pitch that largely held firm to the end – successfully neutered India’s champion bowler. Smith, applied the coup de grâce to finish on 44 not out, while the typically unflappable Joe Root was out in the middle unbeaten on 53.
But this remarkable chase – the second highest in England’s history after knocking off 378 against India at Edgbaston three years ago – was initially set by an opening stand worth 188 runs between Duckett and Zak Crawley, 65. For Shubman Gill, in his first Test match as India captain, it represented something of a gut punch.
This was history but not the kind Gill would have wanted, his side the first to score five centuries in a Test match and lose (only one team, Don Bradman’s Australians in 1928, had done so previously after four). Central to this were lower order collapses of seven for 41 and six for 31, as well as a rash of dropped catches in the field.
For Stokes, on the ground where his legend was cemented by that famous heist during the 2019 Ashes, it represented vindication for that much-debated decision at the toss. It was also the sixth time under his captaincy that had iced a target of 250-plus runs, with MS Dhoni, India’s famous captain, the next best with four.
If Jonny Bairstow was the original spirit animal of Bazball then Duckett has slipped into the role since, something summed up in Rajkot last year when the opener was asked what kind of target England could realistically chase down and he replied: “The more the better. They can have as many as they want and we’ll go and get them.”
It was said with a twinkle in his eye – something inevitably lost in the swirl of social media memes that followed – and in the end a target of 557 proved, ahem, a mere 434 runs too many. But as with every joke, there was a kernel of truth to be found within: Duckett has an innate up-and-at-em attitude that is in sync with the project overall.
Aged 30, Duckett is also a more seasoned, intelligent cricketer than some of those memes would have it. And when he and Crawley set about laying the foundations with England’s highest opening stand in a successful run chase, it was not an explosion of boundaries from the outset, rather a calculated decision to see off the threat of Bumrah and the spikiness of Mohammed Siraj, and then target the relief bowlers.
Along the way there was a running duel with ever-combustible Siraj and plenty for Gill to ponder. Bumrah’s overs were always going to have to be managed shrewdly, while striking a balance between attack and defence was a challenge. And once again the left-right, tall-short pairing of Duckett and Crawley was messing with lines and lengths.
Duckett’s smarts were borne out by the numbers: his first 51 balls bringing 25 runs followed by 77 from his next 70 as a reverse swept four off Jadeja sealed his sixth Test century and unquestionably his best. The pick of the shots? That came on 137 when, with a 6-3 field set, he repeated the dose to Jadeja but this time sent it into the stands.
It was not a chanceless innings, however, and not for the first time in the match it was Yashasvi Jaiswal who let one slip when a top-edged pull from Duckett on 97 evaded his running dive off the rope. Siraj was the bowler denied here, shooting the wunderkind the kind of glance that could curdle milk in an instant.
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There were always likely to be more moments where India would induce some panic and folks expected Bumrah to be the trigger. Instead it was the less-heralded Prasidh Krishna who finally shut down Crawley’s handsome innings mid-afternoon and then jackknifed Ollie Pope with an inswinger that cannoned on to the stumps.
From 206 for two England responded with a flurry of 47 runs to get the home support up once more, only for Gill to turn to the previously anonymous Shardul Thakur and see him whistle up two in two balls. Duckett eventually slapped one to cover, while Harry Brook – he of the three-lived 99 in England’s first innings – was strangled down leg first ball. With Stokes soon in a tangle, it needed rain and tea to settle things down.
That tangle did not improve after the resumption, with Stokes untrusting of his defence to balls that started spitting out of the rough from Jadeja. The England captain did manage to crash four boundaries for 33 runs – the bulk of a 49-run stand with Root – before a reverse sweep off the left-armer ballooned to slip. With 69 still required, England five wickets down, India sensed their chance to pounce.
Staring them down was Root, however, who along with Smith chiselled off the bulk of the remaining runs. There were fireworks at the end, Smith finally taking down Jadeja, but, overall, a pre-match brief from Stokes to get smarter had been realised.
