- Monday, February 24, 2025
England lost their last seven wickets for only 43 runs as Kuldeep Yadav and Ravichandran Ashwin shared nine wickets between them.
By: Shubham Ghosh
ENGLAND failed to rise to the occasion once again with the bat in the ongoing Test series against India as Ben Stokes’s side was bowled out for 218 on the first day of the fifth and final game in Dharamsala on Thursday (7). Their ordinary show saw India wresting command at stumps by reaching 135 runs for the loss of one wicket, trailing by just 83.
The Three Lions, who won the first Test in Hyderabad but went on to lose the next three to squander the series, won the toss and elected to bat on what looked a batting-friendly wicket at the Himachal Pradesh Cricket Association Stadium. They were well-placed at 175 for 3 at one stage but the Indian spin trio of Kuldeep Yadav, Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja triggered a downfall and England lost their last seven wickets for only 43 runs.
Yadav ended with a five-fer while Ashwin, playing in his 100th Test, picked four. Jadeja claimed the key wicket of Joe Root.
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For England, in-form opener Zak Crawley was the highest scorer with 79 off 108 balls. It was his fourth fifty of the series and the third score in the 70s but he failed to convert any of those knocks into a hundred.
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Crawley added 64 runs for the opening wicket with fellow opener Ben Duckett (27), 36 with Ollie Pope (11) and 37 with Root (26). Root then added 38 runs with Jonny Bairstow (29), who was also playing his 100th Test, but after both got dismissed on the team score of 175, the visitors crumbled like ninepins. England lost five wickets for mere eight runs with the Indian spinners wreaking havoc.
Ben Stokes got dismissed for no score.
India came up with a powerful reply, scoring 135 for 1 at the end of the day with captain Rohit Sharma batting on 52 and Shubman Gill on 26. Opener Yashasvi Jaiswal, who has been in superhuman form in the series with two double centuries, also scored a half century and was the only wicket to fall. England spinner Shoaib Bashir took the wicket of the left-hand opener.
Brief scores: England 218 all out (Zak Crawley 79, Kuldeep Yadav 5 for 72) vs India 135 for 1 (Yashasvi Jaiswal 57, Shoaib Bashir 1 for 64) at Day 1 stumps
