England have brought in Bresnan for the injured Finn and maybe surprisingly, Root for Patel.

Only one seamer on each side.

Cook fails again...

The Guardian's OBO description of Cook's wicket:-

England's slowest-scoring day in years (199/5). Root looks pretty settled, 300+ should be the target here.

PS to Hobbes- aye, the ump had an off-day. Bad karma for Dharma.

England 330 all out.
India 87-4 at stumps.

That's 417 runs in two days and 186.5 overs. That's slow...

If Root or Compton never play for England again, does this mean that we'll never see a photograph of them in England kit?

Or of them being presented with their test caps?

I wonder if the BCCI ban extends to use of photographs after the tour is over. If so, we may in "historical re-creation" territory.

I haven't seen the clip yet, but the press descriptions of Tendulkar's dismissal are depressing. It's very sad to see a great batsman reduced to a shadow of his former self. No one likes to remember Wille Mays with the Mets.

ursus arctos wrote:

Ursus, it was a very good ball that would have troubled batsmen in much better form than Tendulkar. It cut from off to middle stump and kept a little low, so there was no shame in him getting out to it.

Anderson is as good an English seam bowler as I've seen and can conjure up slight movement on even the most unhelpful pitches.

I agree with you about Tendulkar though. It's not the way anyone wanted to see him end his career.

Gangster Octopus wrote:


Surely it'll be on their twitter accounts or similar?

meregreen wrote:


I was listening to TMS near the end of the days play, Aggers and Boycott commentating whilst Anderson bowled. They were comparing him to past players, and the names they came up with were Malcolm Marshall and Richard Hadlee. Now Aggers can be a bit of a fanboy, but for Boycott to be praising someone from the modern game to that extent is unusual.

Gangster Octopus wrote:


Scoring is so slow that England were not concerned about exceeding the minimum overs required. That is hugely uncommon these days. Mostly whichever team is bowling is intent on holding the batting sides momentum back, with the concern being that a single high scoring session could swing a match.

Janik wrote:


Boycott overdoes nostalgia for his older 1960s team-mates (Truman, Close, Illingworth), but his hero is Verity who died when Geoffrey was still a toddler.

Impressive attritional batting from Kohli and Dhoni. Difficult to see it leading to a win at the moment, unless they replace the roller with a plough between innings, but it's the sort of partnership that India needed to show that they can guts it out.

Gangster Octopus wrote:

Phil Brown (who I think is PA's England cricket guy) was there when I was in Ahmedabad, and there were a couple of others about. So photos exist.

In fact - despite them going on about having no cameras in the ground when coming in, there was a guy sat behind us who brought in an SLR with a massive telephoto lens. Just kept it at the bottom of his bag when entering and wrapped the lens in a plastic bag so it wasn't so visible. He surely must have been spotted by at least one Indian policeman, but if he was they didn't bother him.

I see E10's up for the OBO in the final session today. Good luck with that. It sounds...well like real old school attritional test cricket.

As I write Cook has just got his second run after something like 55 balls.

I'm happy with attritional test cricket - it's what we were brought up on. I've been watching a fair bit as well.

What I don't get is the complete absence of urgency fron the Indian team. They are 2-1 down with only one test left and at no time have they ever grasped that a turgid draw will secure a series defeat. Why have they never pushed to get quick runs, employ more attacking fields - get England into more vulnerable positions? It has felt throughout the past four days that they were just as keen as England for this test to end as a draw. It puzzles me.

I guess it feels like an improvement on the two previous games, in which they were fairly abject. Push too hard to score quickly and they get castigated for not playing shots appropirate to the pitch and match situtation. Likewise with setting agressive fields, which could force wickets but might also allow the batsmen to score much quicker and get away from you.

Cook fired off by Dharmasena for the 2nd time in the game, and Kohli seems to have upped his levels of gobshitery since finally making a score in the series.

It was laughable watching Ishant Sharma giving Jonny Trott verbals. It must be like being sledged by Alesha Dixon with a beard.

Dhoni's decision to bat on for an hour to score 29 runs was utterly baffling, especially as runs were turned down by Ashwin. The fact that they need to win this Test seems to have passed him by. Surely the best decision would have been to declare overnight and get as long as poss to bowl England out.

What Jimmy says is right - if England can bat through the first hour tomorrow and the new ball is due in this time - then they should be okay to get the draw. What would be fun if England get a lead of around 300 with around half the day to go - would it be worth while declaring to go for a 3-1 win (knowing that India would have a go) or carry on batting the day out. I think Cook will opt for the latter option should that scenario prevail.

Can't see Cook declaring under any circumstances. Imagine the criticism he'd get if they lost.

Well done England. Good to see some new faces in the top six and a return to form for Monty. Quicks losing form and fitness is a problem though.

Tendulkar should retire and Dhoni hand over the test captaincy.