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Having lost the whole of the 1st day to rain, the crowd at Lord's had to be patient to get any sustained cricketing action on day 2 as heavy showers once again limited the amount of play possible.
However, in the 32 overs of cricket that were possible, England's seam bowlers took full advantage of the overcast conditions to bowl out India for just 107 and weather permitting give themselves as fantastic chance of going 2-0 up in the series.
Report on the day's cricket
I had mentioned in my preview of the game that I felt it might be an option to bowl first when winning the toss but that suggestion was based on the weather forecast being a little cloudy, as it was earlier in the week. With the entire 1st day washed out and heavy showers around throughout the 2nd day, it wasn't any surprise to see Joe Root ask India to bat after he won the toss.
Of the 2 teams, England made 2 changes having already confirmed the replacement of Malan with debutant Ollie Pope at 4 and England choosing Chris Woakes over Jamie Porter or Moeen Ali to come in for Ben Stokes. For India, they brought back Pujara to bat at number 3 in place on Dhawan with KL Rahul moving up to open. Kuldeep Yadav was brought in for Umesh Yadav as India choose to go with 2 frontline spinners. With the cloudy conditions today and more overcast weather forecast for the next 3 days, we will have to see if India's decision to play Kuldeep Yadav ahead of a seamer will pay off.
Under heavy clouds and with the flood lights already on James Anderson would have been licking his lips at the chance to get into the India top order and he wasted no time in picking up his and England's first wicket with a peach of a ball that had Murali Vijay aiming a shot through mid-wicket only for the ball to swing late, beat the outside edge and clatter into off-stump. It was the ideal start for England and would have sent shudders down the spines of a few in the India dressing room who knew that with Anderson bowling well it was going to be a tough day to bat. If you were to be ultra critical of Vijay then you might say that he should have been trying to play straighter but the truth is that that ball would have been too good for most right-handers. KL Rahul didn't last much longer, feathering another Anderson away swinger through to Bairstow to leave India 10-2. With Virat Kholi striding to the crease, England sensed an opportunity to send India's captain and the man who offered the greatest resistance in the 1st Test back to the pavilion early on. However, their opportunity was cut short when a shower came over the ground halting play for an hour.
When they returned, India presented England with a gift, as Kohli and Pujara paid there own personal tribute to the recently deceased Barry Chuckle with a little bit of "to me, to you" in the middle. The indecision in the running allowed Ollie Pope to swoop in from gully and with Pujara nowhere in sight the youngster had the easiest job of running the ball to the stumps and flicking off the bails. For Pujara it continued a miserable sequence of 3 run outs in his last 6 dismissals, although on this occasion the blame must fall with Kohli who tempted his partner into the run only to change his mind.
To rub salt in the wound Pujara was followed off the playing arena 30 seconds later by the rest of the players and officials as torrential rain hit North West London, stopping play until 5pm. When they finally resumed, India's captain and Rahane resisted as best they could until Chris Woakes entered the attack. The man from Warwickshire, recalled into the side after an injury found swing away from the right-hander immediately and had Kohli playing and missing at several balls. His 2nd over saw Kohli edge 2 balls just short of the slips and then play and miss with 2 big drives. The next over saw Kohli driving hard once again with Woakes this time finding the edge only for Buttler and Jennings in the slips to get in each others way and put down the kind of opportunity that Kohli had punished them for missing in the first match. However, fortune was smiling on Woakes this time and the very next ball resulted in Kohli playing a similar shot to that which got Murali Vijay out, but instead of being bowled Kohli succeeded in edging through to Buttler who this time made no mistake. For a man who had concentrated and fought so hard against Anderson in particular, Kohli will be disappointed that he let his mind wander against England's first change bowler.
Woakes continued to find prodigious swing and it was soon Hardik Pandya's turn to be dropped one ball (again by Buttler) then caught the very next delivery by the same fielder as everything seemed to be running for England. Sam Curran then got into the action, bowling Karthik with a ball that hooped in and beat another fairly airy drive from an Indian batsmen. Ravi Ashwin offered a bit of resistance alongside Rahane but with James Anderson returning and keen to finish what he started, wickets never looked far away. Rahane was the next to go, edging Anderson to Cook at first slip. Anderson then showed that he likes bowling to left-handers in these conditions just as much as right-handers by setting up young Yadav with three balls pushed across him and then the in-swinger that would have knocked middle stump out of the ground had Kuldeep's pad not been in the way. Stuart Broad finally got into the action with his first wicket as Ashwin's brief cameo came to and end with England knowing that if they took the final Indian wicket in the next 4 balls they would need to bat an over tonight - cue shots of Keaton Jennings nervously biting his nails at slip! Instead India survived and a couple of streaky edges from Shami's bat took them passed 100 before Anderson put his name on the honours board for a 6th time at Lord's by dismissing Sharma to leave India all out for 107.
Analysis of the day's cricket
For England, if they could pack these conditions into a bag and take them to every venue across the world they would win 9 out of 10 matches they played in. Credit though must go to their bowlers, particularly Anderson and Woakes who not only pitched the ball up but made the batsmen play at the vast amount of deliveries that they bowled. For India, they have to accept that in those circumstances some of their players are going to get good balls and be dismissed. However, there were too many players who equally contributed to their own downfall by going for shots which just didn't play the percentages in those conditions. Vijay, Pandya and Karthik all looked very lose outside off stump and even Kohli having battled for the first hour at the crease began to start looking for the big off drive against a ball that was swinging around corners. It's just not smart cricket and it suggests that a few of these India batsmen aren't willing or able to adapt their games to such conditions.
I remember hearing a great interview with Mahela Jayawardene, the Sri Lanka batsman who is currently the all-time leading run scorer in T-20 World Cup matches. As a batsman known more for his controlled and stylish stroke play in Test cricket it might come as a bit of surprise to see him being so effective in T-20 but Jayawardene during the interview simply explained that it was never a case of not being able to play the big shots it was that in Test cricket he understood that the situation and the percentages weren't in his favour to do so. India's batsmen need to take a leaf from his book and learn which shots aren't in their favour in England so they can stop playing them or this tour could get very messy.
Whether we get a result in this match is likely to depend on how much more of the game is lost to rain with the forecast for the next few days being unsettled. From India's point of view they will be hoping that they can escape Lord's with a draw. However, whatever the result is, England's bowlers have just inflicted the kind of mauling on the India top-order that has seen them capitulate in the last couple of tours that they have made here. That is the beauty of Test match cricket and in particular a series with 5 matches in it - when one team gains an upper hand the other team must put all their energy and effort into halting that momentum. With India playing 2 spinners in the match, it would appear that they will be hoping that their trump card and England's weakness against the turning ball can help bring them both back into this match and potentially the series as a whole. We have already seen 1 Test match with plenty of swings in momentum, you wouldn't bet on it happening again at Lord's tomorrow......
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