ENG vs IND, 5th Test: England hand India their biggest ever defeat, cricket pundits question India’s tactics

Edgbaston| The mighty Indian team who dominated the last Test match for three consecutive days lost the plot on the last 2 days. Their performance on day 4 and day 5 certainly points out a fact that either they were too overconfident or they didn’t care about how the game could pan out. It is a matter of surprise that a team having total control over the match for three consecutive days gives away the driver’s seat to the opponent for the final two days of the series. This is becoming a recurring habit with the Indian team and they don’t seem to improve at it any time soon. As far as history is concerned, India at Edgbaston repeated the same mistake that they committed at the WTC (World Test Championship) final.

India had a dominating lead of 132 runs at the end of day 3, and they were expected to capitalize on it, but they failed to do so as they bundled out for 245 runs. The visitors set a target of 378 for England and they comfortably chased it down with seven wickets in hand. Before this England had chased down 359 at Headingley against Australia in the 2019-20 Ashes series.

India might have treated the duo of Alex Lees and Zack Crawley as meager walkovers, but little did anyone know what Lees and Crawley were looking to do, the English batsmen were quick to attack and did not give any kind of respite to India’s dominant pace battery. Both of them put a 100-run stand. India scalped three quick wickets, but the in-form Bairstow and Root steadied England’s ship.

When play resumed on day 5, Bairstow and Root started on auto-pilot mode and looked in a hurry to finish the match off. In the process, Bairstow scored 114* off 145 deliveries with 15 boundaries and 1 six and Root scored 142* off 173 runs which include 14 boundaries and 1 six. 

England has now registered their biggest ever win in red ball cricket. Here is how the cricket pundits reacted to it: