England v India, 3rd Test, Headingley, 25-29 August, 2021

Hameed quickly to double figures, no doubt trying to prove he’s not just Sibley mk 2.

I presume Root’s OK, anyway…

beamer wrote:When they went six down I was going to say “we’re into the batsmen now”, but they subsided very quickly.

I wouldn’t want to have tickets to day 3 here… what’s the record for wickets in a day?

Just shows how bowling with your brain rather than trying to kill the oppo bowlers who went after Jimmeh works wonders. Sham and Bum both removed for golden ducks with smart jaffers.

What might have been at Lords.

To answer beams' Q...27 at Lords in 1888. I'm confident that won't be touched.

A textbook exercise in attacking the top of off amd let the ball and conditions do the work for you.

India have been too inconsistent with the ball.  I also think having all those righties bowling to lefty/righty openers is a good match up for England.

Unbelievable, we’ve done a Melbourne 2010 (was that the last time we “led by an innings” in a Test I wonder?)

Only the third time a team has bowled the opposition out on day 1 of a Test then closed with a lead and all wickets intact. Obviously the aforementioned Melbourne Test was another, and the most recent… NZ did it against Pakistan in 2001.

Two years to the day since the Stokes innings. The ECB has announced that from now on, Test cricket in England can only be played on 25th August at Headingley.

Re India: Good to know they're "not going to back down".

Apparently* Naz and Sunny had a spat on air before play after Naz suggested this Indian side "won't be bullied like previous generations of Indian sides".

Like the petulant little qunt he has always been, Sunny spat back "which previous generations?". It reportedly made for 10 minutes of awkward TV.

Anywho, get that up ya, Sunny. Poms "bullied" the Bannies for just 78. And then passed them none down. LOL.

Just about the perfect day for england so long as root hasnt broken anything.

I too looked at our bowling attack and thought it might get carted once jimmy took a rest, but yobbo
struck either side of lunch, and yokel and curran jr were both on hat tricks. crazy stuff.

However the endless replays of 2019 in the intervals should remind us that we made only 67 and still won. We had Stokes but india have the Punter.

Ishants first over was 1 of the worst, even so he nearly bowled hameed but he deserved a bit of luck,
plus the drop off bum.

Ishant’s last test.

It was madness the Ashwin didn’t  play.

And then, with 4 quicks, win the toss and bat.

Aye, crazy stuff.

Monty goes but England still well on top.

AC now with chance to impress. He’s made 199 and 219 in his last two FC matches, though spread over nearly a year…

Hameed needs to find a way to score a bit more. He was becalmed before Jadeja removed him.

Lets hope Malan and Root can put their foot down a little.

Neph looks in good touch - as he has all year.

Hameed was going along pretty well last night before getting a bit Sibleyed this morning. Though not sure that contributed to the way he actually got out, which was a ball that would have done for just about anyone.

Root never lets the game drift unless he’s seriously out of nick, though. I thought it might be tough for him to top score in this one, but on track so far. Hopefully Buttler and Moeen can come in and fill their boots with the pressure off, and also we have three bowlers who can bat, so the aim has to be to bat them out of the game first time up.

Root is a class above his top 7.

skully wrote:Root is a class above his top 7.

He’s a class above everyone’s top 7 at the moment.

At least the others are doing their bit today. All the top four making 50s can’t have happened for a while. AC is currently averaging 266 in FC this season…

Bugger, that’s just fallen to 134.50.

Great, they’ve managed to clone him…

And there it is, a sixth Test century of the year.

Suddenly it’s his opposite number who’s looking like the Ringo Starr/Andy Murray of the Fab Four…

All going a bit pear-shaped now, we’re probably not going to get to 500.

Wow, cracking stuff from Root. He looked at ease from ball one last night.

He upped the tempo as soon as he arrived and barely played a false shot. Quality stuff.

What a shame Malan was strangled just before Tea. I thought a 500+ total looked on the cards.

Still, England will happily take a 345 lead with 2 in hand. Perhaps Overton can stretch it a bit further.

It now must surely be getting to innings victory territory. I guess E-Coli and others will have something to say about that.

It only hurts when I larf.

Well, wrapped up pretty quickly this morning, after a useful 32 from The Window.

Now, can Jimmy roll them over again? Expecting more of a fight this time around. If they set us three figures to chase it will still be interesting.

The Window breaks down the ersatz Wall, thanks to a flying catch from Jonny B.