The second Test match between India and England, being played at the ACA-VDCA Stadium in Visakhapatnam, was tantalizingly poised at the end of the fourth day's play, with both teams standing a chance to win the Test match.
On Day IV, India were bowled out for 204 in their second innings, leaving England to get a humongous 405 to go one-nil up in the series. The enormity of the task in front of England can be established from the fact that a fourth innings target of more than 400 has only been chased down on four occasions in Test history. In Asian conditions, no visiting side has scored more than 317 in the fourth innings to win a Test match.
In pursuit of 405, England began earnestly, with their opening pair of Alastair Cook and Haseeb Hameed batting out more than 50 overs before the latter couldn’t keep out a grubber from Ravichandran Ashwin.
The performance of the English openers deserves a pat on the back; in conditions alien to them, with the pitch certainly playing a few tricks, with one of the openers not having too much experience of playing in these conditions, they had done something which was not expected and something that has seldom been done by English openers. The 50-over partnership between Cook & Hameed is among England’s longest fourth innings opening partnerships.
By the time stumps were drawn at the end of the day, England had reached 87-2 – losing the wicket of captain Cook in the dying moments of the day. The left-hander scored 54 – taking his tally of Test runs in India to 1073 – before he played across the line and was trapped in front of the stumps by Ravindra Jadeja.
Right until that moment, England were pretty much in the hunt. They still are – but it is going to take something special from them to score 318 runs on the final day. Mind you, if there is any England team that could score in excess of 300 runs on the final day, it is this England XI.
On the other side, India will believe they can pick up the remaining eight wickets on the final day and go one-nil ahead in the series. Not too long ago, in the second Test in Dhaka, England were 100-0 at one stage, before they collapsed to be bowled out for 164. Indian fans will hope now that the Indian bowlers have seen the back of the two well-set opening batsmen, it is only time before the floodgates open.
Will England pursue the target? How long will it take for the Indian bowling attack to pick up the eight English wickets?
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