A Lesson From History - Day Two at Edgbaston

In the autumn of 1958 an England side, unbeaten in test series since 1951, the undisputed world number one and described as ‘the best team ever to leave these shores’, set off for Australia. The following spring they returned having been thrashed 4-0. The Notes by the Editor in the 1959 Wisden bemoan the failure of the much vaunted batting line-up and is critical of the fielding while Peter May, the unfortunate captain, later admitted that the squad had grown old together and was now over the hill. Sound familiar?

Today was by far the ugliest day in what has been an ugly series for India. At Lord’s and Trent Bridge there were times when they looked ready to seize the initiative, but here there was no hope and precious little desire. With the honourable exceptions of Praveen Kumar, who ran in all day as those his life depended on it, Rahul Dravid, who at least looks as though he cares, and Suresh Raina, who is at least an international standard fielder, the rest were at best desultory and at worst an embarrassment. Mishra contrived to bowl no balls off a negligible run up, Laxman spent all day with his hands in his pockets and Sehwag eventually left the field apparently suffering from no more than a bout of ennui. The bowling lacked threat, the fielding was poor and the body language was abysmal: they’re not a dynamic side in the field at the best of times but for much of the day they resembled a team of bored schoolboys, viewing fielding as a necessary chore to be got through en route to the fun stuff rather than as a fundamental part of the game.

Praveen bowled extremely economically in the morning, although he didn’t force the batsmen to play as much as he might, but at the other end Ishant bowled too wide and Sreesanth too inconsistently. The ball moved, but Strauss and Cook played with soft hands and the Indian slip cordon were too deep for any chances to go to hand and progress to lunch was pretty serene, if unspectacular.

After lunch it looked for a time as though England would pile on the humiliation and go past India’s total without losing a wicket, but Mishra broke through, bowling Strauss round his legs from what turned out to (too late for Strauss) to be a no ball. Bell played breezily, although he should have been caught at slip, but by now Alastair Cook, who had struggled in the first two tests, had settled and was looking as remorseless as he had through the winter and the early part of the summer.

Bell fell to a beautiful delivery from the admirable Praveen Kumar which ripped out his off stump, but with India’s body language deteriorating there was to be no respite as Kevin Pietersen laid about him. In the run-up to tea India’s bowling and fielding deteriorated in the face of Pietersen’s aggression and the game finally ran away from them.

The final session saw the departure of Pietersen, a decision that would have appalled Bob Wyatt, after whom one of the stands at Edgbaston is named and who believed that no batsman should be given out LBW on the front foot, but which pleased this old bowler, but Cook and Morgan continued remorselessly to the close. We even saw Tendulkar bowl and some sharp turn from Raina, who was described as ‘right arm optimistic’ by Michael Holding during the morning, which will have excited Graeme Swann.

It’s impossible to see where India go from here in this match. They must try at least to improve, both in their performance and their attitude, but even if they do it is impossible to see them saving the game unless the weather intervenes.