Dhoni's Cameo but England's Day - Day One at Edgbaston

At tea the word ‘Perth’ was pushing itself to the forefront of my mind: England, following a convincing win, had India in trouble only to be hit by a rearguard action lead by a player whose form had been abject to that point. This is the best England team of my lifetime but the scars of the past are hard to shift even for this optimistic Englishman.

As with the first two tests it was a good toss to win, although the decision to bowl first was not the no-brainer it had been at Trent Bridge. India had Sehwag and Gambhir back to strengthen the batting and Mishra, arguably, strengthens the bowling given Harbhajan’s abject form of late, while Ravi Bopara came into the England side to replace Jonathan Trott.

According to many commenters on cricinfo, the return of Sehwag would make all the difference, leading India to the promised land of a massive first innings score, so they would have been bitterly disappointed to see him glove his first ball to a gleeful Matt Prior. It was a decent delivery from Stuart Broad, but Sehwag was slow to drop his hands.

Gambhir and Dravid then batted nicely against tidy bowling, with the ball doing a bit but certainly not going round corners, and it looked for a time as though England’s decision to bowl first may backfire, but Gambhir was bowled driving loosely, Tendulkar, having been greeted by the standard standing ovation, prodded meekly outside off stump and then, on the stroke of lunch, Dravid was the unfortunate recipient of the one unplayble ball off the session, a snorter from Bresnan ripping out his off stump.

India’s travails continued after lunch, Raina, as has been the case for much of the series, not hanging around for long and Laxman falling to the pull shot for the third time in the series. Laxman seems to be having real problems with building on starts, something that has dogged his whole career, for his conversion rate is poor for a player of such class. Maybe it is an issue with concentration, maybe it is an issue with fitness, but this was not the first time that he has got himself out when set.

Mishra didn’t hang around and India were in the mire at 111-7, but the pitch was losing whatever demons it had had and Dhoni, whose batting so far in the series had ranged from the abysmal to the merely weak, finally showed what he was made of, taking the attack to England in partnership with the swashbuckling Praveen Kumar and, for the first time in the day, causing some consternation in the England ranks. Andrew Strauss’s captaincy was questionable at times during the onslaught, as were the tactics of England’s bowlers, but it is not always easy to combat the kind of hitting that we saw here and credit must be given to the two Indians and especially the skipper.

It was too good to last, however. Kumar feathered an attempted hook to Prior, although it needed a review to send him on his way, Dhoni edged to slip where Strauss held on comfortably and then Ishant, summing up the way that the series has gone so far, fell to a freakish catch at silly mid-off from Cook, who didn’t know a lot about it.

The pitch had now flattened considerably (and, in truth, it was never a 111-7 pitch to start with) and England’s openers, neither of whom has been in great form in the series, played watchfully at first and then opened out into a broader range of strokes to leave them 84-0 at the close and firmly in charge of the game. If England can continue to build in the morning and if the loss of Jonathan Trott doesn’t hamper them too much, then it could be a long few days for India.