It’s only the start, but it’s a start, nevertheless. There might appear two ways of looking at it, but irrespective of, the verdict will be unanimous – well begun.
Well begun, of course, is only half done. If they wondered about the wisdom of that pronunciation, India will now be convinced. They didn’t just begin well, they did so brilliantly. With class and assurance and composure and flair, with swag and panache.
They realised that they were recently divorced from a glorious past, but this was their time to carve a stunning present and an extraordinary future. They could have baulked at the prospect of playing for the first time since the retirements of two of the stalwarts of the game; instead they chose to look at this as a grand chance to lay down the marker, to establish their own identity.
India’s first Test since Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli bid adieu to the five-day game sparked wild interest. Tremendous scrutiny. Untold attention. How would a young line-up shape up? How would the first-time skipper, batting at an unfamiliar position, inspire his mates? How would they tackle the English examination, at potentially the most English of venues in terms of what to expect from this country from a bowling standpoint – Headingley at Leeds.
Depending on how forgiving one is, first/second day-first show was either a spectacular success or a promise less fulfilled. 471 all out doesn’t always generate such reactions, you know.
Cold fact 1: Ben Stokes put India in at Headingley on the first morning of a five-Test series, a statement of intent but also a prudent (from the English perspective) choice because England are great chasers (hello, this is Test cricket!). They were willing to forgo first use of a terrific batting strip for whatever reasons floated their boat.
Cold fact 2: 471 all out on being asked to bat first, overseas, was an unqualified success, a result that would have been beyond the wildest imagination of even the most die-hard Indian fan, still to reconcile to life without Rohit and Kohli in the Test lane.
Cold fact 3: As impressive as 471 all out it, it was still underwhelming. Why? Because it was a huge climbdown from 430 for three. To lose seven for 41 anywhere, against anyone, at any stage of any contest, has to hurt. Even from 430 for three. Especially from 430 for three. It’s the lowest total in Test history in an innings with at least three centurions. Capisce?
The three centurions are all still very young men at different stages of their careers. The oldest, at 27, also has the maximum Test appearances, answers to the name of Rishabh Pant, is a veritable force of nature and defies all conventions, all predictions, all adherence to well laid-out standards of norm.
The youngest, at 23, has made it a habit of scoring hundreds in his first Test in overseas territory. Yashasvi
Jaiswal’s 101 on Friday came on the back of 171 on debut against West Indies in Roseau in 2023, and 161 in Perth last November, in his first Test match in Australia.
The man sandwiched between the two vastly different left-hand batters is 25 – see the symmetry in ages there? – and has played more Tests than Jaiswal but less than Pant. He is also India’s newest Test captain, skipper No. 37, the country’s fifth youngest leader. He is Shubman Gill.
Elite group
This trio gate-crashed a fabulous club of two. Hitherto, only on two previous occasions had three Indians scored a century in the same innings in a SENA country – Sunil Gavaskar, K. Srikkanth and Mohinder Amarnath in Sydney (1986), and, more famously, Rahul Dravid, Sachin Tendulkar and Sourav Ganguly in 2002, at the same venue where the Jaiswal-Gill-Pant triumvirate put England to the sword.
The first was in his first Test in England, the second was in his first Test as captain, the third in his first Test as the vice-captain. Remarkable firsts, you have to acknowledge.
Between them, they accounted for 81.1% of India’s first-innings tally. What a grand contribution indeed. Jaiswal now has five Test tons in 20 games, three of them in six matches against England. Gill’s 147, the perfect score in snooker, is his highest in Tests and his maiden three-figure knock outside Asia.
Pant’s 134, which muscled him past 3,000 runs, gave him more Test centuries (7) than any other Indian stumper. It also made him the first overseas wicketkeeper to smack three tons in England – he had a hundred in each of his two previous series in Old Blighty. What’s there not to celebrate?
All other things being equal, these three will form the core of the Indian batting for at least the next half-dozen years. Potentially much more if they stay injury-free and retain form and hunger. They have the skills, the temperament, the ambition and hunger (as of now) and a certain commitment to the longest format that isn’t necessarily a global phenomenon. Unless something goes drastically wrong, they will be at the vanguard of India’s Test batting for a long, long time.
In that journey, they will have for support an intelligent, introverted 33-year-old who has led the country previously in all three formats, but somehow didn’t pass muster with the decision-makers when they sat down to zero in on Rohit’s successor.
K.L. Rahul played his first Test in December 2014 in Melbourne, made his maiden hundred the following week in Sydney. He has wowed and wooed but he has also disappointed and frustrated. He is too good a batter to average in the mid 30s, yet that’s what the numbers say. And the numbers don’t lie, do they?
Rahul played a nice little hand on Friday, 42 in an hour and 50 minutes during an opening salvo of 91 with
Jaiswal. It was their 201-run association in the second innings in Perth in November that forced Rohit to split his successful combination with his fellow Mumbaikar at the top of the Test batting tree. Until that game which Rohit missed as he was on paternity leave, Jaiswal had opened exclusively with his captain in his first 14 outings.
The double-century stand between Jaiswal and Rahul compelled the skipper to bat in the middle-order for the first time in more than six years, which in some ways precipitated his retirement from the longer format because he had three fruitless innings at No. 6, then a further two more back as opener at the MCG before sitting himself out of the final Test at the SCG.
Rahul has shown himself to be flexible, adaptable and versatile – in December 2023, he batted at No. 6 for the first time in Tests in Centurion while also keeping wicket and still made a fantastic hundred in challenging conditions against a gun pace attack – though sometimes, those traits have been his worst enemy because he has been moved up and down the order. Now, hopefully, he will have a settled run back as an opener so that not only can he guide and mentor the much younger Jaiswal but also give his skipper the confidence to go about his business without fuss, knowing that the opening slots are in safe hands.
India would have expected more from the other two in the top six in Leeds, one on debut and the other on his ‘second debut’, if there is anything like that.
Sai Sudharsan forced his way into the Test setup on the back of a terrific run of scores in the IPL, sure – where he was Gill’s opening partner at Gujarat Titans – but also owing to his promise, if not exceptional returns, in the first-class ecosystem.
He was strangled down the leg-side – unfortunate, but also a slight setback because he should have known the field was set for that kind of dismissal, given that England had two leg-slips for all four deliveries of his brief stay at the crease – but it will be silly to judge him on that.
The one on his ‘second debut’ is India’s only Test triple centurion apart from Virender Sehwag. Karun Nair’s
303 against England in Chennai in December 2016 is a distant, almost painful memory.
He was out of the Test XI three Tests and three months later, last featured in the Test squad in the summer of 2018 and seemed destined to not add to his six caps when he broke down seemingly impregnable doors with sheer bloody-mindedness and a desire to prove to himself that he still belonged.
Anxiety and a quick end
Like Sai Sudharsan, he too fell for a four-ball blob, sucked into an aerial drive in his anxiety to score his first Test runs in eight years and three months. To walk in on the back of a 209-run partnership always carries the risk of a cheap dismissal.
Watching from the sidelines for 50 overs and four hours can take a toll on even the most seasoned; if Karun felt the heat more than most because of the significance of the occasion, it’s perfectly understandable.
Two smart catches on Saturday afternoon should have eased his nerves plenty. It’s more than likely that he has already put his first-innings batting misadventure behind him.
Like his good mate Rahul – the two have played plenty of cricket together for more than two decades – Karun is also 33 and a good series in England will set him up for the immediate future.
In an otherwise young batting top whose average age is less than 24, these two ‘veterans’ loom as guiding lights. India’s first innings in the new normal of Indian Test cricket could and should have been more fruitful, but it wasn’t without several sterling moments. It’s from these moments that the promise of a vibrant, bountiful tomorrow stems. Well begun, and all that…
