England have called on a sell-out day-five crowd to roar them to victory at Lord’s after a raucous atmosphere towards the end of Sunday spurred them to take four India wickets and set up a cliffhanger conclusion to the third Test.
England were bowled out for 192 to leave India chasing 193 and England 10 wickets to take a 2-1 lead in the series. Though the first-innings centurion KL Rahul was unbeaten on 33 at the close, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Karun Nair and Shubman Gill were all dismissed cheaply before Ben Stokes uprooted the off stump of Akash Deep, the nightwatcher, with the final ball of the day to leave the tourists 58 for four overnight.
“The buzz around the ground really gave the boys the lift they needed,” said Marcus Trescothick, the team’s assistant coach. “And a couple of late wickets gave them that hope that we’re bang on the money. So it will revolve around the first hour of the day, how positive India can be, how dominant we can be with the ball, and how many early wickets we can get.
“If we can create some form of atmosphere that’s very similar to that – it may not start the same way, it might take a wicket to get it going, we might need Joe [Root] to wind them up again. But the support has been brilliant throughout, both teams are really well supported, and it’s great that we have that.”
At times the rancour seen towards the close on Saturday spilled out again, with Mohammed Siraj aggressively celebrating the early dismissal of Ben Duckett, and India borrowing some of the delaying tactics previously deployed by Zak Crawley as they sought to limit the number of overs bowled before stumps. This undercurrent of aggression seems to be supercharging the motivation of both teams.
“It definitely helps in this situation, having that competitive edge from both teams where they’re desperate to win,” Trescothick said. “I have no problem at all with what goes on. There was a bit on [Saturday] night, there was a similar situation tonight. Of course both teams know there’s always lines you can’t cross, but I don’t think it’s really been troubled too much in this game and it definitely helps the atmosphere.”
Washington Sundar, who took four wickets in an innings for the first time in a Test outside India, said his side were “sitting pretty” and that he was “looking forward to tomorrow in every way”, with the release of their more competitive spirits helping his teammates to thrive
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“I would say the aggression is always inside of us, in both dressing rooms,” he said. “There was an incident that happened and it sort of came out last evening, and it did come out quite a bit today as well. So it’s all the more interesting for all of us. It’s sport and everyone is quite aggressive and quite intense in their own ways – no matter the sport if you’re an athlete it’s a common fact, it’s always inside of an individual.”
