2nd Test: Bumrah’s double-strike, Kuldeep and Axar scalps help India leave England at 155/4

Visakhapatnam, Feb 3:  A sizzling double-strike from Jasprit Bumrah, along with Kuldeep Yadav and Axar Patel picking a scalp each helped India bounce back in the second session on day two’s play at the Dr. Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy ACA-VDCA Cricket Stadium on Saturday.

At tea, England are 155/4 in 33 overs and trail India by 241 runs. The session began with birthday boy Zak Crawley getting a life at 18, when Shubman Gill couldn’t hold on to a chance at short mid-wicket. Crawley proceeded to take four boundaries off Bumrah and even took a boundary off Ashwin by beating leg-gully on his right.

But India soon had a wicket when Kuldeep Yadav got extra bounce on a good length ball which Ben Duckett tried to defend and the ball was safely caught by silly point. Ollie Pope survived on his very first ball when KS Bharat couldn’t gather the ball cleanly, thus missing a stumping chance.

Crawley continued to go his way undeterred – driving Kuldeep firmly through long-off for four, before slog-sweeping for six to get his fifty in just 52 balls. While Pope was being tested by the Indian spinners, especially by Ravichandran Ashwin on the outside edge, Crawley was nailing his slog-sweep, punch and drive against the off-spinner for boundaries as England reached 100 in 20th over.

Crawley’s fun came to an end on 78 when he tried to take on a slightly wide ball against Axar Patel and the ball took the leading edge to a back-tracking backward point. Joe Root was off the mark with a reverse-sweep, but was teased by away-swingers from a probing Bumrah. The plan worked well as Root poked at the corridor of uncertainty and edged to first slip.

Pope was the next person to be taken out by Bumrah, looking clueless against a pacy inswinging yorker which slipped past his toes to leave middle and leg stumps in complete mess. Jonny Bairstow has looked very fluent in his 24 not out from 28 balls, especially in cutting off the spinners for boundaries, while Ben Stokes (five not out) ended the session with a slog-sweep off Kuldeep for four.

Brief scores: India 396 in 112 overs (Yashasvi Jaiswal 209, Shubman Gill 34; James Anderson 3-47, Rehan Ahmed 3-65) lead England 155/4 in 33 overs (Zak Crawley 76, Jonny Bairstow 24 not out; Jasprit Bumrah 2-27, Axar Patel 1-24) by 241 runs