PANTASTIC TON SWEEPS CRICKET
There was something utterly magical about Virender Sehwag, a man who hit Saqlain Mushtaq for a six to become the first triple centurion in India’s cricket history — just months after falling to the same shot at 195 in the Boxing Day Test at the Melbourne Cricket Ground.
But it’s difficult to imagine if even Sehwag would have shown the audacity to reverse-sweep a pace bowler as crafty as James Anderson on a two-paced pitch, with the match poised on a knife-edge.
But if you are Rishabh Pant, you would just grab the bull by the horn. Not that Pant is reckless. The 23-year-old wicketkeeper-batsman has a neat defence to fall back on, the fruits of which he reaped when
India were in dire straits at 146 for six, chasing England’s first innings total of 205 on the second day of the fourth Test.
The first 50 of his 101 runs on Friday came off 83 balls, thwarting the relentless wave of attack from the Anderson-inspired Englishmen with a straight bat and calm head.
Then Pant put the tiring English attack to the sword with a flurry of audacious shots. But the one that took the breath away was the reverse sweep he played against Anderson over the slip fielders for a boundary before reaching the hundred with a six over the square leg boundary off Joe Root.
Barely two months after his Brisbane epic, Pant gave a masterclass in the art of changing gears in Test cricket as his third century in the five-day format eventually helped India gain a precious lead of 89 runs with three wickets in hand.
“This is the way to bat in Test cricket. Calmness, clarity, trust in defence and attack at the right time, brilliant from Pant,” Michael Vaughan, the former England captain, tweeted.
Already the second highest scorer in Test cricket this year, Pant has shown once again his rare talent to conjure matchturning innings.
And if he can sustain this brilliance, the fearless lefthander can go on to become as ruthless as Adam Gilchrist, the man who revolutionised the role of wicketkeeper-batsmen.
“What a knock under pressure...not the first time and won’t be the last time..will be an all time great in all formats in the years to come,” Sourav Ganguly tweeted after the end of an extraordinary innings from an extraordinary player.
With England desperate to return with a drawn series, India still have a long way to go in the final Test. But the Pant heroics have kept their hopes of sealing a place in the ICC World Test Championship final alive.