If Test matches had been reduced to being four-day contests, what would’ve happened?
The recent Anderson-Tendulkar Trophy, which captured the imagination of the cricketing world, would have ended 0-0; hardly an advertisement for the longest format of the sport.
We would’ve been denied the 56-minute series finale – the drama, suspense, agony, ecstasy and heroism when sports mirrors life in a microcosm. If the match had ended with England needing 35 runs and India four wickets, everyone would have left with an empty feeling in their stomach, having been denied something.
A four-day game would have denied England the thrill of the big last-day chase in Leeds and kept everyone unsatisfied if the Lord’s Test ended with India needing 135 runs and the hosts six wickets.
Even the euphoria of the Manchester draw, as India recovered from 0-2 in the third innings – staring at a 311-run deficit – would have been muted if they didn’t have to bat out a fifth day.
One can’t rush through life; things happen when they have to. Some Tests do end inside three or four days, but that’s the natural course of events; just how things turn out. For every mismatch – West Indies 27 all out recently in Jamaica, where the fourth innings lasted a grand total of 14.3 overs, is a case in point – there is the Anderson-Tendulkar Trophy where the result was in doubt going into the final session of almost every match.
Five-day slugfests – like 12-round heavyweight boxing bouts (it used to be 15 in years gone by) – can sometimes take competitors to hitherto uncharted territory and force them to do something they may not have known they were capable of. In a sense, they tell sportspersons more about themselves than any abridged form of contest ever can.
Mohammed Siraj’s heart and spirit got the deserved reward only when he bowled India to its narrowest-ever Test victory on the fifth morning at The Oval. Chris Woakes, with his left arm in a sling, wouldn’t have needed to come down the stairs with England needing 17 runs with one wicket in hand. Ben Stokes wouldn’t have had to miss the fifth Test after playing four four-day games.
Five days is a long time, especially in this era of diminishing attention spans. It’s natural that the sustained competitiveness takes a toll on the nerves and tempers often boil over, as was seen during this series on more than one occasion. But with the meet-and-greet session after hostilities were over, there’s hope that whatever altercations took place on the field – and on occasions, off it – would not be lingered over.
Flawed teams
The cricket may not have always been of the highest level, with docile pitches and soft balls often sucking the life out of bowlers, but there’s something fascinating about watching two imperfect teams having a tilt at each other. They have to cover up their weaknesses with their stronger suits and find ways to get the job done. Late on the fourth day at The Oval and on the fifth morning, it was clear that India had only two bowlers who could be relied upon to take them to victory – Siraj and Prasidh Krishna. And as England found out to their cost, in Stokes’s absence, they couldn’t leave it to their lower order to get over the line under the intense pressure of a game having such high stakes.
Both teams can pat themselves on the backs for playing their part in an enthralling series, but if the Indian team management and the decision-makers employ cold hard logic, they should be disappointed at not coming away with full bragging rights.
That the tour was the first one after the retirements of Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma and Ravichandran Ashwin, with pace spearhead Jasprit Bumrah expected to play only a limited part in the series, it would have been a step into the unknown. But on the evidence of the five Tests, man-for-man, India was the team with the better resources, personnel-wise.
England have one of their openers averaging in the early 30s after nearly 60 Tests, a No.3 batsman who looks too fidgety for that key position, a wicketkeeper-batsman who started the series in an impressive fashion, but tapered off towards the end, no quality spinner, and a pace-bowling attack unlikely to give any quality opposition sleepless nights. They were highly dependent on the charisma and inspiration of their captain, and when he wasn’t there, they contrived to collapse from a series-winning position in the fifth Test. That India were still one big hit away from potentially losing the series 1-3 should be a sobering thought.
Points to ponder
Where India didn’t help themselves was never picking their strongest XI. The team management was forever obsessed with batting depth, ignoring that without the ability to take 20 wickets, it’s unlikely to win a Test. The two matches that India won in the series were the result of two bowlers doing almost all the damage – Siraj and Akash Deep in Birmingham, and Siraj and Prasidh at The Oval. That’s a risky template to rely upon.
A proven match-winner in Kuldeep Yadav sat out the whole series, while left-arm pacer Arshdeep Singh, who could have provided much-needed variety in the attack and could have flourished, at least in the final Test, has yet to make his debut.
Much of the narrative revolved around how many, and which, Tests Bumrah would play, which could have been a needless distraction.
Taking all these factors into consideration, Shubman Gill did a more-than-creditable job in his maiden assignment as Test captain. It helped that he had a series with the bat that players often dream about, and as the tour progressed, it was evident that he grew into his leadership role.
As far as head coach Gautam Gambhir is concerned, his record till date reads five wins, eight defeats and two draws, with two of the wins coming against Bangladesh at home. Whatever win-loss ratio the former India opener ends up with, the 0-3 debacle at home against a Kane Williamson-less New Zealand side would be a millstone around his neck.
For a team with India’s resources and fan following, anything less than making the final of the World Test Championship (WTC) will be considered a failure. They will now shift their focus to the home summer. The two Tests against a struggling West Indies side in spin-friendly conditions – going by recent results in the Caribbean – may not be a stiff task, before reigning WTC champions South Africa knock on the door.
A drawn series in England may have brought a feel-good factor in Indian cricket, but there’s a need to build on it.