Great to be sitting here, 32 degrees, beer in hand, watching the cricket. Good start by Burns and Sibley, until Burns tried a reverse sweep and was caught. Then Lawrence went quickly after for a duck, so suddenly from 62 for no wicket was 64 - 2 at lunch. However, Sibley has played really well, and I was one saying he wasn't good enough with spin, I'm eating a bit of humble pie. He has got his 50 and with Root they are now 129-2
Been watching since about lunch....good stuff, one thing has just startled me though, all the talk of Root making his 100th appearance, Ishant Sharma i've just seen is on 98 tests.....would never have guessed that!
Nasser Hussain picked up in the 2nd test 1st innings a major difference between Root vs Sibley/Crawley, basically Sibley and Crawley were closing off their shoulders and not coming down the pitch straight....looks like Sibley's worked v hard on that between innings in Sri Lanka and out here too, opened his shoulder, coming at the ball straight and 2 consecutive innings he's made runs in tough conditions...well done Sibley and well done Nas I say
Sounds like you should respond to the dissertation questionnaire then?(not someone I know by the way, I just spotted it and thought some on here might have views they want to share...)
This was a massive toss to win, bowling first in India is often fraught with peril but particularly so looking at this pitch
A real shame Sibley got a good one in the last over. Played really well and deserved his 100. Root was majestic and had to see out the last few over cramping up, so did well to stay there until the close. All in all a really good day for England, just a bit of gloss taken off it with Sibley's dismissal. We need to score big tomorrow and long and give the Indian's a big total to chase and the pitch 2 days old.
Good effort Day one. Good Old Root 66, hopefully now in a period of his career were he can restablish himself in the worlds top few by turning those 50-70's into biggies. And someone on here suggested Sibley would be a walking wicket in India. Still cant understand resting Bairstow for this one, when he's played less test cricket than anyone over the last year. I cant find the stats, but the last time we played in Channai, we scored something like 450 first knock and still lost by an innings and a lot. So we need as good a day tomorrow plus.
Agreed, some questions I didn't know how to answer as disagreed with all alternatives. Like Chazz, I'm not a fan of this slog rubbish, so "The Hundred" is not my thing at all. Might as well watch baseball.
No stopping Joe Root double century again, what a player he is! It's a pity Stokes holed out on 82.he looked set for his 100. So 454 -4 at Tea, Root 209 & Pope 24.
This is an unprecedented, God like run of form from Root. Other than a slightly iffy start and a run out chance, he hasn't looked like getting out. England should now be looking to only have to bat once on this pitch, the odd ball has done a bit, but it will be hard to take 20 wickets.
