You notice more because of the tension. It increases the senses. It shows you that Ben Stokes spread his left arm wide before the start of the game to welcome everyone to a Huddle, to spread his passion and to penetrate his players.
It shows the little boy in a brightly colored India shirt written with ‘Rohit’ on the back, dancing up and down through the aisle in the Compton stand just after tea. He had started to believe. The India fans everywhere around him had also started to believe.
India walked closer and closer to their target. Fifty runs to go, 40 points to go, 30 points to go. What seemed impossible a few hours ago was to become unbelievable and it was clear to look possible.
The tension was unbearable. The last time I had felt a knot in my stomach if it was during a cricket match during the World Cup Final 2019 at Lord’s, when the match between England and New Zealand was one way and then another and always too close to call.
With the tension you can hear the complaining air that enters the cheers of the supporters of England. “Come on Jofra, you can do it,” a man begged while Archer came and accelerated from us in his run -up to the daycare.
What a day it was. What a sports party. There have been some classic tests in the house of Cricket and this was certainly one of them. It was an epic. It was a privilege. It was another memory of the magic of this form of the game.
Jofra Archer celebrates the dismissal of Washington Sundar during an epic meeting
Jasprit Bumrah provided a stubborn cameee, because India seemed to be to go to victory
India -Batsman Mohammed Siraj is comforted by Zak Crawley and Joe Root after the victory of England
It had everything. It had heroes. It had pantomime villains. Hope rose and got stepped and then got up again. It had comebacks and failures and triumphs and anger and joy and delighting and despair.
It let Stokes play his heart, Archer Bowling as a demon on the fifth day of his first test match for four years, and the provision of one of his characteristic moments by Bowling Rishabh Pant, sending his off-stupid cartwieling on the ground and then give him a shipping to start up.
It had Jasprit Bumrah with a stubborn cameo with the bat and Ravindra Jadeja who compiled an innings of perfect skill and courage to bring the tourists in sight of one of their most famous victories in England.
Stokes bowed almost all day before. That’s how it felt anyway. I am not sure if I have ever seen a sportsman who wanted to win a match as much as Stokes wanted to win this game.
When he thought he had caught Kleed Rahul LBW for lunch, he sank on his knees as a Christ figure while he desperately encouraged the referee, looking for illumination of his suffering and his desire.
Both parties played on the edge. There was always the needle, the most clear on Sunday morning when Mohammed Siraj shouted in the face of Ben Duckett after he fired him. It returned to Monday when India had reached 103-7 and back in the match crawled and Brydon Carse and Jadeja collided in the middle while Jadeja completed the first of two runs.
Carse grabbed him briefly when they passed and once he had grounded his bat, Jadeja returned to confront the English bowler. There was enough of that. Many hard looks from Stokes and looks from Siraj when he came in to form a stubborn last Wicket standard with Jadeja.
This felt a world away from the manufactured excitement of Twenty20. This felt deeper.
There were jubilant scenes when England prevailed after the end of an excellent meeting
Stokes played his heart and bowed almost all day when England came to the top
India’s Ravindra Jadeja compiles an innings of perfect skill and courage
And when it became more difficult to catch his breath and the man in line behind ‘Jesus Christ’ muttered when India came a point closer to the total and it seemed that this test would never end, Jadeja and Siraj needed only 23 runs to seal their triumph.
Shoaib Bashir Boog for Siraj. Bashir, who had played the role of Bit-Part Player in all this unfolding drama while Stokes and Archer played the role of superheroes. Bashir, who played with a broken finger who holds him from the last two tests. And Siraj, who had been proud of his resistance.
In the beginning it seemed that Siraj had defended the ball well. He got his bat on it and forced him in the ground, away from curious hands. While we looked, there was a sigh of disappointment. Another ball defended by India. Another chance disappeared.
But then there was a strange break. The ball bounced and turned backwards, as if it is being pushed by an invisible force. In his confusion, Siraj tried to get out of the way and it slowly rolled through his legs.
It was like a slow-motion series. The ball rolled gently on the base of the Wicket of Siraj and came to rest peacefully against the stumps. And while Siraj stared in horror and realized what he had done, one bail fell slowly, slowly on the floor.
Pandemonium followed. There was a delayed roar of triumph of the English fans in the ground. The players of England harass Bashir. Siraj bowed his head and still stayed stock. At the end of the non-triker, Jadeja was also frozen, the only sign of his despair a tilt from his head to heaven.
Zak Crawley and Joe Root went to Console Siraj, just as Andrew Flintoff Brett Lee had hit after a similar nail biting collision between England and Australia in Edgbastone 20 years ago.
They don’t come around too often, days like this. Just like that game, this was one for the centuries.
#epic #competition #centuries #memory #magic #Testcricket #writes #Oliver #Holt