India beat England by 106 runs to level the five-match series 2-2 in the second Test. The game took place at the YS Rajasekhara Reddy ACA-VDCA Stadium in Visakhapatnam, Andhra Pradesh. The home team won thanks to a stellar showing by their players across all three departments.
First, it was young opener Yashasvi Jaiswal’s stellar double century in the first innings that gave them the advantage. Then, Shubman Gill’s calculated century in the second that gave them the breathing space and the ability to set an unchaseable target of 399 to England in the fourth innings.
Jasprit Bumrah, a man for all occasions, turned up when India needed him the most. He took six wickets in the first innings and three more in the second to ensure the English batters could not get a grip on things.
Bumrah was adjudged as the player of the match at the end of the game. In the post-match ceremony, Bumrah said he had been practicing the yorker as a kid since he had seen Wasim Akram and Waqar Younis do it for Pakistan.
Since Bumrah has come up from the ranks of tennis-ball cricket, he has mastered the skill of bowling yorkers at all times of the game. Naturally, it makes him a great threat whenever he has the ball, as several English batters found out in Vizag.
For England, the rot has started from the top ever since Joe Root and Jonny Bairstow have failed to get amongst the runs. Since the bulk of the scoring now falls upon the shoulders of young Zak Crawley and Ollie Pope, the Englishmen found the going quite challenging.
The perennial James Anderson, who was chosen in the playing eleven in this game, picked up three wickets in the first innings and two more in the second. Still, the way he bowled, swinging the ball both ways, made his exploits noticeable. The action now moves to Ranchi, Jharkhand, for the third Test, to be played from February 15 to 19.
