As the second day of the Lords, Test came to an end, both the teams are evenly matched with England stationed at 119 for the loss of 3. Joe Root once again led from the front with an exemplary knock while the other English batters struggled.
Earlier in the day, India faced another batting collapse as they lost their last 7 wickets for a meager 88 runs. As soon as Rahul departed, the others followed suit in quick succession. Had it not been for the cameos of Ravindra Jadeja and Rishabh Pant, things could have been further worse.
India was off to a solid start with the ball in the hand that saw Mohammad Siraj forcing Dom Sibley to hole out to Rahul while the next ball was an absolute scorcher that claimed the wicket of Haseeb Mohammad.
Rory Burns and Joe Root stitched an imperative stand for the third wicket and were well on course to defy further success to the Indians but Mohammad Shami had other plans. He claimed Burns for 49 with another peach of a delivery that caught him plumb.
However, the man of the hour for England was once again their captain and the man of the match in the preceding game, Joe Root. He played a brilliant knock of 48 runs, staying unbeaten for the third day of play.
He played a few exquisite strokes that left the Indian bowlers clueless. He has been technically perfect and the strokes that he has managed to stitch together have been nothing short of brilliant.
He has also found a proclivity of scoring against India now as his form against the hosts has been impeccable. After his blistering century and the knock that he played tonight, he also achieved a herculean feat.
His name came in second place in the list of batters to be the fastest batsmen to gather 2000 Test runs against India. Pakistan’s Javed Miandad is in the first place to achieve this feat from 35 matches while Joe Root notched up the feat in 38 matches.
The players who follow suit in this list are Clive Lloyd, Michael Clarke, Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Alistair Cook and Ricky Ponting. However, Joe’s achievement of this feat is a lot more special considering the bowling strength that India currently possesses.
