Hameed’s series could be over

HASEEB HAMEED’S first Test trip could come to an early end as confusion surrounded the extent of his finger injury. Hameed did not open England’s second innings, with team medics preferring to wait until after the game to send him for an X-ray. And if scans reveal a break to his left little finger, England will consider a replacement from the Lions tour in the UAE, where candidates include Middlesex’s Nick Gubbins, Durham’s Keaton Jennings, Daniel Bell-Drummond of Kent and Tom Westley of Essex. The alternative would be one of two discarded batsmen currently in India — either Ben Duckett, who opened during the Tests in Bangladesh, or Gary Ballance. Hameed (right) was expected to bat at some stage today in Mohali, though it could prove to be his final knock on a tour on which he has batted with calmness beyond his 19 years. Meanwhile, Jonny Bairstow shrugged off Virat Kohli’s tit-fortat response to the late wicket of Ben Stokes. Stokes had covered his mouth after removing Kohli on the second afternoon, having been reprimanded by the ICC for foul language following his own dismissal on Saturday. Kohli then reacted to Stokes’s second-innings dismissal by putting his finger to his lips in a shushing gesture. ‘It’s up to him, isn’t it?’ said Bairstow. ‘He’s obviously quite a vocal character. But that’s Virat. He gets a bit wound up. We’ll just leave him to it. If he wants to do that, let him do that and we’ll go about our business.’ England tried to slow India’s progress in their first innings by bowling to packed off-side fields. Unsurprisingly that tactic did not find favour with Ravindra Jadeja, who eventually fell short of a maiden Test hundred when he dragged a wide leg-break from Rashid to long-on. ‘They were bowling very boring lines,’ said Jadeja. ‘Outside off, outside off, outside off. ‘I thought I could disturb the bowler, get outside off and hit through the leg-side where there were just two fielders. The shot I got out to, that is my shot. I always hit that ball for six but the ball came off the wicket slowly, so the impact wasn’t powerful.’