India v England First Test Chennai Feb 5th-9th

[Jock McTuffnel v3]

Will probably wake up now..

[Sir Virgs and Zamora]

Oh no. Gutted for sibley. Great innings though.

[Jock McTuffnel v3]

Looks plumb.

[Chin Music]

Good innings from Sibley. Bit of a waste of a review though. If he hadn't nicked it, that is one possibly lost for Stokes/Buttler et al. Good day overall for England though.

[Jock McTuffnel v3]

Gives India a sniff but England's day by a big margin.

Can we get 237+ more tomorrow ?

[Sir Virgs and Zamora]

That wicket is a shame but what a brilliant day for England. We won a crucial toss and cashed in. Joe root is so good and getting back into the chat with Williamson and the others.

Looking forward to tomorrow.

[Sir Coolerking]

Originally Posted by Sir Virgs and Zamora

Oh no. Gutted for sibley. Great innings though.

Not that gutted, if you're concerned about him missing out on a ton, well he was there for 286 balls.

[Sir Virgs and Zamora]

Although losing the toss and india being 270 for 3 would have led to amusing ranting about our spinners so that is a shame. Now we can have that when they don’t win us the match! Something to look forward to.

[Jock McTuffnel v3]

Originally Posted by Sir Virgs and Zamora

Although losing the toss and india being 270 for 3 would have led to amusing ranting about our spinners so that is a shame. Now we can have that when they don’t win us the match! Something to look forward to.

I'd be betting on Jimmy to take the wickets when we bowl.

[ConfusedMale]

Definitely England's day! We selected the wrong XI, captaincy was uninspiring, fielding was indifferent, bowled more no balls than we should have. England batsmen, excepting Lawrence, all managed to get starts and both Root and Sibley cashed in as well. Yes, the toss went England's way, but that is the one thing neither team had any control on.

India should try and get a couple more early wickets tomorrow morning to stay in the hunt, or this could be a very long series!

[Sir Coolerking]

Interesting stat, touring teams in India finishing Day 1 with 3 or fewer wickets down have only lost once in 47 matches (27 wins). The defeat was the Aussies at Chennai in 2001 in that astonishing series (Harbhajan took 15 in the match).

https://www.espncricinfo.com/series/...full-scorecard

[ConfusedMale]

Wow! So, all the right boxes being checked by the English. Let us hope tomorrow brings us better fortune.

[sharky]

Wonderful again from Root. I can't believe he has played 100 Tests already, hopefully this is the early stages of the kind of run of form the greats go through.

[Rebelstar]

Originally Posted by Jock McTuffnel v3

So no need to worry about scoring rates ?

23 overs to go - England should be on around 230. Hopefully no more than 4 down.

I was as surprised India nearly bowled 90 overs as I was at England's scoring rate, both (things) deserve some credit

[Aidan11]

Well done England, Well done Root.

I'd have taken this score before play began. Shame I've missed most of this while at work.

[Rebelstar]

Originally Posted by Sir Virgs and Zamora

For an hour after lunch they were excellent. With nothing in it for the bowlers it is so hard. Let’s hope we bat all day tomorrow and the pitch falls apart.

watched the C4 lunchtime highlights, lunch in the coverage not here, and couple of chances went begging to slip and keeper, low but could have been caught

and England faced a lot of good balls that they played well or didn't get out to.



Still a long way to go though, rumour has it both sides have to bat and as the England total is far from a winning one (yet) still maybe 4 days to go before we'll find out if England's good position becomes a winning one

[Rebelstar]

Originally Posted by sharky

Wonderful again from Root. I can't believe he has played 100 Tests already, hopefully this is the early stages of the kind of run of form the greats go through.

Wish I could remember the stat cited by C4, someone else might, about how much Geoff Boycott played first class games compared to Root.

In fact may just look see what their comparitive match counts are, obviously one is still playing.....

Boycott - 609 first class matches, 108 Tests
Root - 159 first class matches*, 100 Tests*

May well have been how many more first class matches Boycott played over Root, to date, 450 which is staggering

[Rebelstar]

Originally Posted by ConfusedMale

Plus, what are the alternatives?

Ali did quite well batting #4 in India some time ago, which is the longer shot, someone with experience and a history in the country in question or someone with limited experience and no real history (one innings?) in same country hoping they'll come good....?

Obvious downside to Ali is the amount he's played in recent years, but if you're going to pick someone theoretically a good player of spin only to see them knocked over by a non-spinner then you have to wonder if he'll last long enough to face much spin!

[Jock McTuffnel v3]

Originally Posted by Rebelstar

Still a long way to go though, rumour has it both sides have to bat and as the England total is far from a winning one (yet) still maybe 4 days to go before we'll find out if England's good position becomes a winning one

Yes - 500 should be the target. Too many times England have a good start and fail to get to 400.

Get 500 by after tea tomorrow and it will be tough to lose the match.

[AJ101]

Felt much like the first day of England last tour of India to me, albeit less runs scored as we had Sibley opposite Root rather than an in form Mo.