Some years ago I found myself, for reasons which escape me, watching Sky’s rugby league coverage just at the point when Stevo, at the end of a lengthy rant, described league as ‘our game, the greatest game’. He was, of course, wrong. The greatest game, as we all know, is cricket, and its greatest form is test cricket.
Test cricket, of course, is at its best when there is a balance between bat and ball and although conditions at Trent Bridge were perhaps overly helpful to bowlers, this was preferable to watching batsmen having it easy. India, having won an important looking toss, bowled beautifully and although Alastair Cook’s dismissal was further evidence that the luddites obstructing the use of Hawkeye as part of the DRS are wrong, the other England batsmen could have no such complaints. Praveen Kumar could probably swing the ball anywhere so he was particularly dangerous, but Ishant resumed where he had left off at Lord’s and Sreesanth was at his least bonkers at England fell to 124-8.
When these two sides last met at Trent Bridge in 2007, England had Chris Tremlett batting at number eight, with Ryan Sidebottom, Monty Panesar and Jimmy Anderson following him and it isn’t unreasonable to assume that had that been the case today England wouldn’t have made 150. Times, however, have changed. With Tim Bresnan replacing the injured Tremlett England had a number nine with a test hundred to his name and a number ten with an average of around twenty-fine and a highest first class score of 183. Stuart Broad must be the first lower order batsmen in test history to make an unbeaten seventy in one test and find himself moved down the order in the next.
Broad’s recent test record with the bat bears some scrutiny. Since the Oval test last year, where he began to recover some form, he has played nine test innings. He’s been out for nought three times (twice first ball), for three once and six once. However, if he gets into double figures his lowest score is forty-eight and, in spite of those failures, he’s averaging 44.25. Here he, in tandem with Graeme Swann, decided that attack was the best form of defence and his buccaneering sixty-four carried England to the relative respectability of 221. It seems odd to think that it is only just over a week since many people, including me, didn’t think that he should be in the side at all.
England came out to bowl with a spring in their step that had seemed unlikely not long before and when Anderson removed Mukund with the first ball of the innings the momentum seemed to have shifted their way. They had reckoned without Dravid and Laxman, however, who survived with some good fortune and a lot of skill to the close. Tomorrow promises to be a fascinating day.
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