India's defeat over England by a record 317 runs – the biggest in terms of runs – will go down in history as one of the home team's more famous wins. Not only because they were coming off a 227-run defeat in the first Test, but due to the spin brilliance of R Ashwin and Axar Patel. Ashwin had a match to remember as he picked up a five-wicket haul and followed it with a century, while Axar, making his Test debut, claimed a five-wicket-haul and became the sixth Indian spinner to claim a five-for on debut.
As far as England are concerned, their batting was outclassed by some sharp bowling on a spin friendly deck. Even though England had Moeen Ali and Jack Leach, the spinners looked threatening only in patches, compared to their Indian counterparts of Ashwin, Axar and Kuldeep Yadav, who seemed to be on top of the English batsmen throughout the Test. That, as per former captain Nasser Hussain, as he puts it, is 'the main reason' behind England's defeat in Chennai.
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"Ali got eight wickets (in 2nd Test) and he bowled some real beauties, like the one to bowl Virat Kohli in first innings and got him out twice in the game - but Mo himself will admit that in first innings, he didn't quite have the control and 4-128 is not what you're looking for on such a minefield for the spinners," Hussain wrote in his column for Sky Sports.
"If you compare that to how India's two spinners bowled and the control of Ravichandran Ashwin, they didn't do anything magical, they just jammed it in there ball after ball," said the 51-year-old Hussain, who played 96 Tests between 1990 and 2004. If you're asking me the main reason why England lost the Test match, I would say if you look at India's main two spinners - Ashwin and Axar Patel - they were more consistent than the England spinners."
{{/usCountry}}"If you compare that to how India's two spinners bowled and the control of Ravichandran Ashwin, they didn't do anything magical, they just jammed it in there ball after ball," said the 51-year-old Hussain, who played 96 Tests between 1990 and 2004. If you're asking me the main reason why England lost the Test match, I would say if you look at India's main two spinners - Ashwin and Axar Patel - they were more consistent than the England spinners."
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Hussain understood that even though the Chennai surface aided the spinner, it wasn't unplayable as many believe, as shown by Rohit Sharma and Ashwin, who each struck a century. Hussain wants English batsmen to learn from the application shown by Rohit and Ashwin on the pitch and come out with stronger performance in the remaining two matches.
"I can't be overly critical of England's batting. They can learn though; India had a batsman in Rohit Sharma who scored nearly 200 runs and bowling all-rounder Ashwin got a second-innings hundred on it so it was not impossible. England have got to look at that and ask what Rohit and Ashwin did so well to try and learn and improve," Hussain explained.