Losing down-the-wire games isn’t the same as losing when you aren’t toe-to-toe. The abrupt snuffing out of nervous excitement from a moment ago is ruthless, more so when it ends in a way as cruelly anti-climactic as it did for India at Lord’s. Mohammad Siraj’s bails were uprooted by the slightest of nudges from the ball. After the game, it was hard to tell what Shubman Gill was exhausting himself to do: hide the disappointment that he couldn’t land on the better end of a fantastic game or express the triumph that his team stretched the impossible until it became plausible.
“I’m extremely proud, this is as close as a Test match can get,” Gill said, speaking to the media after the game. “Five days of hard-fought cricket comes down to the last session, last wicket. I’m extremely proud.”
Ravindra Jadeja was India’s last hope. This was nothing new for him, nor was it for India. He has batted with the tail to save games many times before. But he couldn’t see the end of it, with Shoaib Bashir’s ball ending the last stand by sending Siraj off in the most unfortunate way. All Jadeja could do was heave a sigh of whatever such an emotion could be called when a long and hard-fought battle isn’t lost, but not won either. He scored an unbeaten 61, which was India’s highest individual score in the last innings. He batted for 181 balls, the most by any Indian batter in that innings.
“He’s very experienced,” Gill said of Jadeja. “We didn’t want to give him any message. He was batting brilliantly with the tail. Wanted him and the tail to bat as long as possible.”
After equalling England’s 387-run total on the dot in the first innings, India reduced them to 192 and got themselves an achievable target. But the last few overs of Day Four saw them lose three wickets for peanuts. Gill rued the lack of contribution from the top order, who failed to hold their ground.
“The last one hour that we played [on Day Four], I think we could have applied ourselves a bit better, especially the last two wickets that fell,” Gill said. “Even this morning, the way they came up with a plan, we were hoping for one 50-run partnership. If we got it from the top order, it would’ve been easy for us.”
The opportunity was too heavenly for England not to build on it. Rishabh Pant, KL Rahul, and Washington Sundar all fell within the first seven overs of the last day. India were seven down before even crossing a hundred runs, but Gill says they always had hope that one decent knock could turn the game in their favour.
“There was always hope, as long as there’s batting,” he said. “[Needed] one 50-run partnership. The target wasn’t massive, one 50-60-run partnership and we were right back into the game.”
Gill is three games into his captaincy stint, and a defeat such as this tends to age captains years in a moment. India still have a solid chance at getting back at England, but with a 2-1 lead, the hosts will back themselves to pack the series in the next game.
