Rohit Sharma, Rahul find their zone in first England Test
India dismissing England on Day 1 left the opening pair with the tough job of seeing off James Anderson in the evening at Trent Bridge.
It is rather unlikely that either Rohit Sharma or KL Rahul would’ve been expecting to bat in the third session even as late as the final over before tea, with England on 138 for three in the second session and a partnership building between Joe Root and Jonny Bairstow. But then the well-set Bairstow got out on the cusp of the upcoming interval, and on the other side of the break England collapsed and collapsed heavily – without a trace of a fight. And there they were, just 15 frenzied overs into the third and final session of this manic opening day of the Test series in Nottingham, Sharma and Rahul prepping themselves to face the new ball and James Anderson.
Sharma hadn’t before faced that combination of Anderson plus fresh lacquer in a Test match in England before because the only other time he faced the hosts on these shores (which was back in 2014), he was a lower middle-order batsman. A late-career transformation from middle order to opener in the toughest format is shocking enough, but what remains even more startling is that Sharma had played just one Test against England in their backyard despite having been around as an India player since 2007. To put that in perspective, Rahul (who made his international debut seven years after Sharma) had five Tests in and against England on previous tours.
On the other hand and even after counting the World Test Championship final against New Zealand in June, Sharma had a cumulative experience of two Tests in England before Anderson ran in to bowl the first ball of the Indian innings on Wednesday. Both those games came in Southampton, spread seven years apart. Which made Trent Bridge his first experience of red-ball cricket in this country outside of the Rose Bowl. And what an experience it threatened to be, against the best fast bowler of the modern era and on the same pitch and even under the same conditions that England had lost their last seven wickets for 45 runs – their entire batting order falling to India’s pacers.
Below a low-lying roll of dark clouds, the first ball from Anderson was full and sharp, which Sharma looped his head over and dead batted. If either Anderson or any of the bowlers from England’s attack needed a clue on how Sharma was going to tackle the forthcoming hour, then that was it. But Anderson must’ve believed otherwise for a while after his second ball, shorter of length and swinging away, was nicked through the slip cordon for a boundary.
Sharma had chased it with hard hands, but he would fast learn to neuter everything else bowled at him with a much softer grip. It is often said that the key to batting success in England is to play the ball late, this of course to counter the late swing. Sharma would soon display that he had imbibed that too, always grinding the pacer’s effort to dust. Most of the 40 balls he faced today were played defensively, but on the rarest occasion when he chose to attack Stuart Broad in the sixth over – well after settling his nerves – he did it with characteristic confidence. On one knee, he lashed the width ball all the way to the square boundary.
For India to come out of the day unscathed, however, Rahul had to hold his end up too. And he too had his share of recent demons to deal with before walking out to bat. At least Sharma had been consistently playing Test cricket of late; Rahul hadn’t worn India’s whites since August 2019. While he did travel with the squad to Australia earlier this year, an early injury forced him out of a four-match series that saw only two of India’s Test regulars feature in the final Test in Brisbane.
But you know what they say about what goes around. It came around for Rahul after both Shubman Gill and Mayank Agarwal got injured in the lead up to this series. And with the bit finally between his teeth, he wasn’t simply going to spit it out. Like Sharma, Rahul too was circumspect – the odd attempt of a cut through square perhaps a hangover from his last appearance as a Test cricketer in England, which resulted in a most glorious fourth innings hundred at the Oval.
Plenty of water had flowed under the bridge between then and now, but Rahul did what had to be done. He ate up 39 balls to Sharma’s 40, both of them getting to stumps unbeaten with scores of nine runs each. Those numbers perhaps don’t truly reflect the nature of the beast they had just slain, but the first and most daunting hurdle of this tour yet had been crossed by men who wouldn’t have dreamed of opening together in Test cricket as recently as two years ago.