Team India has been batting out of their skins to resist the onslaught brought by the England bowlers. Replying to the huge score of 569 runs for seven declared, India are still 46 runs away avoiding a follow-on. India has scored 323 runs for the loss of eight wickets. With only tail enders remaining, it would be hard for India to overcome at least those 46 runs.

Murali Vijay, Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma, Ravindra Jadeja all got starts against England, but could not capitalize on it. Ajinkya Rahane scored a well-made 54 runs and M S Dhoni was not out on exactly 50 runs when the play on the third day ended.

India is already one up in the series and would like to at least draw this Test match. This all depends on how they bat. The bowling conditions have been good and it was indeed very difficult facing world-class bowlers like Stuart Broad and James Anderson, let alone scoring runs against them.

Now that India has come thus far, should we call it their stubborn batting to rise to the occasion? Well, if you evaluate how the batsmen got out, you can certainly understand if they were really battling it out, or that they have found themselves in this sorry state.

Shikhar Dhawan has a hard time in this series. He is not scoring runs at the top and has been getting out to his weakness that has been pinpointed by the English team. His getting out early also puts a lot of pressure on the middle order as there are no runs early on.

Virat Kohli does not look the man he is with bat as we all know. Somehow, he is not in his groove. He looked set for a big score yesterday. But Anderson ended his stay of 39 runs at the crease by provoking a catch at the slips.

It looked like Ajinkya Rahane would once again play the pivotal role in bailing India out with a century as he did earlier in the series. However, a slight lack of concentration and the temptation to pull a short ball cost him his wicket, which came at the wrong time for India.

All in all, it has been a mixture of wrong shot selection and luck. It remains to be seen how far India can go on from here on.

Article Posted By : abhi_bangal  On July 30, 2014lView All Articles

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India England third Test 2014