England take Leeds & India hopes
CHENNAI: WHEN rain forced early tea on the last day of the first Test in Leeds, Headlingley on Tuesday, England were 102 runs shy of yet another famous victory. Two back-to-back wickets in the 55th over bowled by Shardul Thakur might have acted as a roadblock in otherwise a smooth chase but even then they have an upper hand over their opponents as reliable Joe Root and skipper Ben Stokes were at the crease.
Openers Zak Crawley and Ben Duckett had already added 188-run stand by then with the latter slamming 149 off just 170 balls taking Indian bowlers to cleaners.
Even as others were unable to break the partnership, India's fifth bowling option Thakur was introduced in the 12th over of the day, 18th of the innings and soon taken off the attack after sending down only three overs. Agreed, he was going for almost run-a-ball then but another pacer Prasidh Krishna was equally expensive.
The Mumbai medium pacer was brought back only in the 53rd over, 31 overs after the captain decided to discontinue with him. Playing as a bowling-allrounder and probably preferred over Nitish Kumar Reddy for the match, the 33-year-old could bowl only six overs in the first innings even as four others including Jasprit Bumrah bowled 20 or more overs. The story was no different in the second essay.
England, in contrast, were more uniform as far as their usage of full-time bowlers was concerned. All five bowled 20 or more in the first innings and they went on to bowl 15 or more in the next essay with part-timer Joe Root chipping in with three overs. Offie Shoaib Bashir bowled the most overs in both the innings for them giving much-needed reprieve to the pace attack. Their opponents, meanwhile, adopted an entirely different approach as underbowling Thakur meant premier pacer Bumrah and Mohammed Siraj had to bowl the most.
Under utilisation of the fifth bowler can cause a big problem especially in the longest format of the game and India seem to have been doing it intentionally or unintentionally, especially under head coach Gautam Gambhir. The former India captain so far has used the fifth bowler only nine per cent away from home. It is around 17 per cent when India play at home. That apparent preference was there for all to see when Thakur was again taken off the attack only two overs later after giving India the twin successes.
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