England broken as Kohli and spinners turn up the heat
It was the day England’s wheels well and truly fell off, a day at the home of Indian cricket where the fourth test felt more like a blood sport than a contest between what were meant to be evenly matched teams.
From a magnificent double century by Virat Kohli, to spin bowling of the highest class from Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja, India were playing a totally different game yesterday to an England team who could not cope with them.
this was embarrassing for England and their captain Alastair Cook; a fourth day which exposed all their limitations in this part of the world and will today lead to a crushing third successive loss and a comprehensive series defeat.
Yes, India were hot favourites to win this series on the back of a formidable run on home soil that has seen them go unbeaten here for four years and rise to become the No1 test team in the world.
And yes, Kohli was touched by genius during his third test double hundred of the year, an innings that confirmed him as a true Indian great in the longer form of the game on top of his mastery of one-day and twenty20 cricket.
But what will haunt England is that so much of the damage over the last month has been self-inflicted and they again made mistakes at the Wankhede Stadium that contributed hugely to their downfall.
Remember, no team has ever lost at this ground after scoring 400 in their first innings but, despite such riches, England went into the last day in danger of becoming only the third side in history to score so many and lose by an innings.
And remember, they had India 307 for six on Saturday and would have been strong favourites to win if only Adil Rashid had hung on to a sharp return chance from Kohli just eight runs later, when the Indian captain was on 68.
Instead, they let those last four wickets more than double India’s score and allowed Jayant Yadav, picked in this series for his bowling, to become the first India No9 to score a test century in a whopping stand of 241 with Kohli.
the first session yesterday was arguably England’s worst since the dark days in Sydney three years ago, when they could do nothing to stop Australia rampaging to an Ashes whitewash.
this time, Kohli and Yadav — also reprieved on the third day when Joe Root dropped him — smashed 128 in the morning without giving a hint of a chance, while India went on to add 180 in 40 overs in all before England finally prised them out.
When Keaton Jennings completed the most contrasting of debuts by being dismissed first ball to add to his first-innings century, and Cook and Moeen Ali followed before tea, it looked certain England would be beaten in four days.
Mercifully, Root and Jonny Bairstow gave them a semblance of respectability by hitting 89 in the 19.4 overs bowled after the interval.
Root was furious with himself for yet again falling between 70 and a hundred and broke his bat in frustration on the way back to the pavilion, but at least he did not waste a review after being trapped palpably lbw by Yadav.
Bairstow, batting with remarkable freshness after spending 182.3 overs keeping wicket, lived to fight another day, but England were six down at the close, still 49 behind, thanks to their last bit of dumb cricket.
It was a surprise to see Jake Ball walking out as nightwatchman at the fall of Ben Stokes’ wicket — the all-rounder was unlucky to be caught off his boot — and naive of both Ball and Bairstow not to waste a little time as the clock ticked round to 4.30pm here.
that meant India could squeeze in another over and, sure enough, Ball, who did so well in the first innings alongside Jos Buttler, fell to Ashwin off what became the last ball of the day.
It just about summed it all up for England.
there are already those who are firmly pointing the finger at Cook for England’s predicament, but it is far too easy to heap all the blame on a captain who yesterday resembled Sisyphus from Greek mythology pushing his boulder up the steepest of Mumbai hills.
England once again picked the wrong side here — and Cook has to take his share of the blame for that — but is it really any surprise that the experiment to play a third spinner was abandoned when the only options available to back up Rashid and Moeen were Gareth Batty and Liam Dawson?
Cook’s bowling changes could be questioned, but all he was doing was shuffling the chairs on his titanic as reality dawned on him.
this is not the day to question Cook’s future. that will come soon enough.
For now, England have to look at the myriad mistakes they have made that have made it too easy for the world-class men of India to beat them into the ground.