Propelled by Joe Root and Jonny Bairstow’s majestic centuries, England defeated India by seven wickets and registered their highest-ever successful run chase in Test cricket. England made a mockery of the 378-run target in the morning session of the fifth and final day as the Yorkshire duo sitched an unbeaten 269-run partnership to help the Ben Stokes-led team square off the series 2-2.
Edgbaston Test: Root, Bairstow power England to 7-wicket win against India, series ends 2-2
Here’s a look at the highlights from Day 5 of the Edgbaston Test:
India captain and India’s player of the series Jasprit Bumrah: That’s the beauty of Test cricket, even if you have three good days, you have to keep giving a good performance. We fell short with the bat yesterday and that is where we let the opposition in to let the match slip away from us. Ifs and buts can always be there. If you go back, if there was no rain in the first match, we could have won the series. But England played really well. We have drawn the series and both teams played very good cricket and it was a fair result. The captaincy is not what I decide. I like responsibility. It was a good challenge, a new challenge. It was an honour to lead the team and a great experience.
England’s player of the series Joe Root: Love playing. It’s as simple as that. The environment has been great and the guys are having fun in the last four weeks. There is absolute clarity that we were chasing it down and there was total belief. (On his form) It’s something you are constantly searching for and something you rarely find. You want to keep it as fun as possible. Watching Jonny (Bairstow) bat is great, I just wanted to give him strike. We have been riding a brilliant wave of confidence after brilliant performances against NZ. The start the two openers got us off to was superb and they put the pressure back on.”
Player of the match Jonny Bairstow: It is great fun at the moment. I am stripping it back to the basics. The last few years have been tough on me but the last few months have been fantastic. Day five was over in 90 minutes. I just have an enjoyment factor now. I am not afraid of failing and just want to put the pressure on the opposition. We are going to lose games with the approach we have, but it is a positive fun brand of cricket to play. India have some world class bowlers and you just have to soak the pressure. They try to intimidate, they have some fantastic players and it was about trying to shift the pressure on them. There was a period when it started reversing as well. And this morning was a different morning. Root and me are just two lads from Yorkshire. We have grown up playing together and spent a lot of time together from the Yorkshire academy days to the Test team now. Special to play with him.
Also read: ‘Special win by England’, ‘This should hurt India’: Reactions after Root-Bairstow show at Edgbaston