Root’s first-day knock a shot in the arm for England

It was good to take advantage of what was a pretty good pitch, which might change through the course of five days. It was important to start well

RAJKOT: Written off before the series, Joe Root made a statement on the opening day of the first Test that England will be no pushovers in the series.

“It’s a nice start to this series. Something to build on now and it was a great day of cricket for us. Hopefully, tomorrow (Thursday) Moeen (Ali) and (Ben) Stokesy can go on and make a really big score and take us into a really good position going into the second innings,” said Root after taking centrestage at the Saurashtra Cricket Association Stadium.

“(It was good to) take advantage of what was a pretty good pitch, which might change through the course of five days. It was important to start well,” the stylish middle-order batsman added.

Root’s 124 runs would have helped silence the pre-series talk JOE ROOT, England middle-order batsman who got his first ton in Asia

on the challenge of playing spin on the subcontinent wickets.

“It’s something that going forward will give us confidence and hopefully will give the rest of the guys some confidence as well. I thought everyone who went out there looked comfortable until their dismissals against the spinners and that should be a good thing for us moving forward.”

The England vice-captain said his team was targeting a total of 500 and predicted that the wicket would deteriorate, which will allow them to put pressure on the India batsmen.

It was his 11th Test hundred and Root termed it one of his most satisfyingbecauseof thesubcontinent conditions and the recent trend of not converting his half-centuries.

One of the fascinating periods of play was the battle between him and R Ashwin. Few batsmen have handled Ashwin as confidently as Root on Wednesday. He credited the work on improving his defence.

“It wasn’t a specific approach (against Ashwin). More than anything, as soon as anyone lets go out of the ball, you just got to play what’s coming at you. We tried to make sure we used the both sides of the wicket. Not just score with the spin, but try and do against if the opportunities arose. Make it hard for him to bowl one length. Just keep it as simple as that.”