Root, Rashid seal it for England
THIRD ODI India get taste of own medicine as legspinner weaves a web; Test skipper hits second successive century
with dangerman Kuldeep Yadav as well. To his luck, Root was at the crease when he came to bowl and the England Test captain, who hit 113 at Lord’s continued from where he had left, working around Kuldeep’s bowling. The chinaman bowler’s first spell read 4-0-23-0 before he finished wicketless, going for 55 runs in 10 overs.
England elected to bowl and their bowlers put up a strong showing to pin down India’s powerful batting. After playing on sun-kissed grounds, India faced tough English conditions on Tuesday. Shikhar Dhawan (44 runs), Virat Kohli (71), Dinesh Karthik (21), Mahendra Singh Dhoni (42) and Hardik Pandya (21) all got starts but couldn’t capitalise.
RASHID SHINES
Mark Wood and David Willey bowled well with the new ball, but the men who made the difference were spinners Adil Rashid and Moeen Ali.
Leggie Rashid made the biggest splash. In a dream spell of 10-0-49-3, he put England on top in the decisive game. It was his double strike in the 31st over that knocked the wind out of India’s sails. Rashid produced the ball of the series to knock Kohli’s off- stump, with a delivery which pitched outside leg and turned across to the disbelief of the India captain. Raina fell on the last ball of the over, turning a leg spinner into the hands of the leg-slip fielder.
For Virat Kohli, it was a rare series where he failed to capitalise despite being set in all three innings. It has been a strange series for India’s premier batsman. He has coped well with the pace test but fallen to the spinners in all three outings, twice to Rashid with Moeen nailing him at Lord’s. To be fair to Kohli, he was done in by an absolute beauty on Tuesday. 2 44 71 21 42 1 21 21 22 Willey 9-0-40-3, L Plunkett 5-0-41-0, M Ali 10-0-47-0, B Stokes 6-0-43-0, A Rashid 10-0-49-3.
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