On day five in Rajkot, Virat Kohli played a heroic knock to help save the match for India. Afterwards, in the post-match conference, he was brazen about the fact that England had fallen short of a stunning victory by only four wickets.

“From the outside, it perhaps looked more difficult to bat on that it really was,” said the skipper after criticising the pitch for bearing “too much grass”.

Now, there are two ways to look at his statements in summation. Firstly, it was because of the grass that the Rajkot pitch didn’t break up as much, and helped India survive that final session when the visitors pushed hard for a win. From this vantage point, yes, England did play out of their skins over five days and put the hosts under duress. They certainly came out on top there, mentally at least.

This is where the second pointer provides a contrasting view. That Rajkot pitch, held together so nicely by that green tinge, did not behave in keeping with how wickets in the New Zealand series behaved. It allowed England certain freedom in their play, both with bat and ball. Of course, India dropping five catches in the first innings helped too. In summation then, Alastair Cook and his men weren’t really tested, not in the slightest bit.

Within the bubble of events in Rajkot alone, England played fantastic cricket. And a lot was said about their batting strength. Yes, three hundreds in one innings – Ben Stokes is a marvellous all-rounder, Moeen Ali came good against India again, and Cook, well, there is no stopping him. Even a 19-year-old kid impressed.

A lot was said about their bowling too. The fact that their three spinners took more wickets than the three Indian spinners alone silenced any other argument. No other words were needed.

Testing conditions

Step outside this bubble, though, and you will find yourself at the end of day two in Visakhapatnam. Here, India won the toss and put on 455 runs in their first innings. In reply, England were struggling at 103/5, trailing by 352 runs, and needing another 153 runs to save the follow-on.

At this juncture, let us talk about their bowling first.

It was all about Virat Kohli on this second morning. Would he get to his double hundred, and maybe triple after that? What about 400? To say that everyone present at the (ridiculously named) Dr YSR ACA VDCA Cricket Stadium had one or all of these thoughts wouldn’t be an exaggeration.

Ben Stokes had other ideas though. He dropped Ravichandran Ashwin one ball, and caught a sharp one off Kohli the next. That is how things work out sometimes, when left to chance of course. And England have been guilty of doing just that, on both days one and two.

They let things flow after lunch on the first day, when Kohli and Cheteshwar Pujara beat them to pulp. They made another mistake delaying the second new ball thereafter, hoping it would swing more on day two morning. It didn’t.

Kohli’s wicket then provided them a chance at redemption. India were still placed at 351/5. They needed to somehow keep the score under 400. There needed to be more urgency in their bowling, and a heightened sharpness in their fielding. And by some design, Ali provided them with twin breakthroughs, of Wriddhiman Saha and Ravindra Jadeja.

Shoddy with bat and ball

England though have been shoddy with the ball and lethargic in the field for these past two days, and they continued to be so. It has underlined the fact that they bowled in Rajkot under the blanket of a 500-plus total. Here, that advantage had been negated at the toss and they came up short, despite reducing India to 22/2 at one stage.

Now, let us talk about their batting.

A beauty from Mohammed Shami cleaned up Cook. Scratch that. A scorcher from Shami smashed Cook’s off-stump in pieces. No amount of runs can prepare a batsman for such a delivery when he has just come to the crease. This, however, was the only wicket India took on day two.

Smashed. (Image credit: Reuters)

The remaining four were given away – the first two literally, and the other metaphorically.

Joe Root ran Haseeb Hameed out, with slight help from Dhoni-esque Saha. There isn’t much a youngster can do in such instances, and the kid didn’t even glance angrily towards his partner. “Sometimes these kind of innings are broken through run outs,” said Ashwin later on. It reflected on the intense session in play.

Falling in the trap

And this is where Root, as one of England’s two top batsmen has to shoulder the blame. When he reached his half-century, he had scored 50 of his team’s total of 76. It wasn’t as if he was batting on a different pitch, for he had been beaten time and again. Instead, he had set up a template for the remaining batsmen to replicate and bat on this wicket.

Go for your shots, and get the runs – it is classified under positive intent. The only glitch, well, Root holed out off Ashwin. It was a trap set for him, and he bit. This was the turning point of the day. For, the next two batsmen didn’t look at the intent bit.

Instead, they focussed on how the pitch was behaving. Ben Duckett is in for a nightmarish tour if he is going to dance outside leg-stump when countering spin. Moeen Ali copied Hameed (13 off 50) in scoring one off 21. The runs simply dried off. The pressure grew, and eventually the wickets came.

Stokes and Jonny Bairstow resisted thereafter. Perhaps, back in the dressing room, Root had told them not to concentrate on the pitch’s demons. Can the duo keep it going on day three though, and stage a miraculous escape?

“Not a lot was said in the dressing room at the end of the day,” revealed England’s assistance coach Paul Farbrace later on. Well, rightly so!