5-wkt win in fourth test and series 3-1, show India’s supremacy on home turf

‘Tourist-unfriendly’ India bag five-wicket win and series against England

 RANCHI: India have remained Test cricket’s most tourist-unfriendly destination for over a decade and even England’s gung-ho Bazball approach could not change that reality today.

The score is 3-won! India once again came back from a pressure situation and fought back to win the match. It shows the character and the mental strength of our players. Sachin Tendulkar

YES!!! Phenomenal series win by our young team. Showed grit, determination and resilience. Virat Kohli

17 Consecutive Test series wins for India at home, a streak that began by defeating Australia in 2013

India’s five-wicket victory on a spiteful track here was not really a cakewalk, thanks to England’s never-say-die spin attack.

But it fetched Rohit Sharma’s team an unassailable 3-1 lead in the five-match series, and consolidated their second place, behind New Zealand, in the World Test Championship standings.

This was India’s 17th consecutive Test series win at home, where they have not lost a Test series since an Alastair Cook-led England bested them in 2012.

For England, who won the opening Test in Hyderabad and have been competitive as well as entertaining in Visakhapatnam and Ranchi — it was their first series defeat under captain Ben Stokes and head coach Brendon ‘Baz’ McCullum.

India is particularly happy they clinched the series despite the absence of batting mainstay Virat Kohli (personal reason) and frontline seamer Mohammed Shami (injury).

Middle-order batsman KL Rahul missed out after hurting himself in the Hyderabad opener, while they rested pace spearhead Jasprit Bumrah for the match in Ranchi to manage his workload. It forced India to field four debutants in the first four matches

and three of them — wicketkeeper Dhruv Jurel, batsman Sarfaraz Khan, and seamer Akash Deep — impressed immediately.

Player of the Match Jurel struck 90 in the first innings and kept India’s hopes alive in the contest and his unbroken 72-run stand with Shubman Gill today helped India pull off a nervy chase.

“Obviously it’s a big challenge to play Test cricket. We all know that,” Rohit said. “Dhruv Jurel, playing his second game, showed solid composure and calmness. He has got the shots as well and played all round the wicket.”

England’s meltdown

England’s second innings meltdown left India needing 192 runs to win. The hosts raced to 84 for no loss before Shoaib Bashir’s triple strikes turned the match on its head reducing India to 120/5.

On a pitch where the ball turned sharply and often kept low, Jurel and Gill proved immovable despite the mounting pressure.

***********************************************************************

Readers

These are extraordinary times. All of us have to rely on high-impact, trustworthy journalism. And this is especially true of the Indian Diaspora. Members of the Indian community overseas cannot be fed with inaccurate news.

Pravasi Samwad is a venture that has no shareholders. It is the result of an impassioned initiative of a handful of Indian journalists spread around the world.  We have taken the small step forward with the pledge to provide news with accuracy, free from political and commercial influence. Our aim is to keep you, our readers, informed about developments at ‘home’ and across the world that affect you.

Please help us to keep our journalism independent and free.

In these difficult times, to run a news website requires finances. While every contribution, big or small, will makes a difference, we request our readers to put us in touch with advertisers worldwide. It will be a great help.

For more information: pravasisamwad00@gmail.com