England on the ropes after Kohli comes up with the goods again
VIRAT KOHLI jumped for joy and punched the air with a delight befitting the animated approach he has shown throughout his avowed mission to beat England into the ground here and avenge three long series of hurt.
For the India captain, the outcome of this series has appeared personal and the manner in which he soaked up the acclaim of the biggest crowd seen in four Tests so far as he reached a sensational 15th Test century proved it.
India, at least under MS Dhoni, always appeared resigned to losing Test series in England, but coming second best in their own conditions, as they did in 2012, was a different matter — at least to Kohli.
The man who succeeded Dhoni has been the biggest reason why India are unbeaten in 17 home Tests since they lost decisively to Alastair Cook’s England in Kolkata four years ago — and here he went a long way towards making it 18.
Joe Root, meanwhile, admitted that England picked the wrong team for the fourth Test, after their four seamers bowled only 24 overs between them on the third day.
On a day when India advanced to 451 for seven in reply to England’s 400, there was a huge burden placed on England’s two frontline spinners, with Moeen Ali bowling 30 overs and Adil Rashid 31.
Root himself bowled two with his off-breaks, even burgling a couple of wickets.
But he said: ‘In hindsight, I think we would have liked to play an extra spinner. But it would be silly to think about things that are out of our hands now — we’ve got to make the best of what we’ve got. ‘It was quite frustrating we couldn’t take the wickets at the back end, there,’ he said, after Kohli and Jayant Yadav took their eight-wicket stand to an unbroken 87. ‘It just proves that when you create those half-chances, you’ve got to make sure you take them.’ It became a cruel day for Cook, who suffered another testing day. He came under fire from his old bete noire Kevin Pietersen, who used Twitter to criticise the England captain for the way he used his six-man attack, seven including Root, and his delay in taking the new ball. Pietersen may have had a point, but it is difficult to be too harsh on Cook when he does not have the weapons at his disposal to seriously trouble the No 1-ranked team in the world in these conditions. This is now a series that England will lose today or tomorrow unless they summon up quality batting against Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja that has been beyond them ever since they started so promisingly in the drawn first Test at Rajkot. That glimmer of hope now seems an eternity ago.