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Shubman Gill, 'You think you'd get away by treating Zak Crawley like that?': India captain made to swallow pride
Stuart Broad noted England's heightened aggression, led by Ben Stokes at Lord's. He said it was triggered by Shubman Gill's actions against Zak Crawley.
England great Stuart Broad said India captain Shubman Gill was horribly wrong if he thought he would get away easily by treating England opener Zak Crawley roughly during their second innings. The Test series, which was played on friendly terms, took a dramatically fiery turn after Gill got involved in a scuffle with Crawley and Ben Duckett in the last over of Day 3 at Lord's.
In their second innings, England came out to bat with just six minutes left on the clock. It was more than enough to get two overs in under normal circumstances, but Crawley was determined to ensure England faced only one over. He employed deliberate time-wasting acting of various kinds right from the onset, and once he stopped Jasprit Bumrah in his run-up in the middle of the over, Gill lost his cool.
He charged in and hurled abuse at Crawley. The Indian slip fielders, KL Rahul, Nitish Reddy and Karun Nair gave a mouthful to the England opener. Things got uglier when Crawley called for the physio after being on the gloves in the fifth ball of the over. Gill stretched matters by making an aggressive run towards Crawley and making an Impact Player signal, suggesting that he call for a replacement. This time, Crawley snapped back. He was joined by batting opener Ben Duckett. Gill then exchanged a few words with Duckett.
Crawley survived that over and was greeted with sarcastic claps from the Indian fielders. The tension continued on Day 4 as India pacer Mohammed Siraj gave an aggressive send-off to Duckett after dismissing him.
Broad said this fired England up. "You think you can get away with talking to one of our players like that? Wait until we gain the upper hand in the match," he said on commentary when England players were giving back to India in their 193-run chase.
Towards the end of Day 4, when Gill walked out to bat at No.4, he was surrounded by England's close-in fielders, who all had a go at him. The Indian captain was not at the top of his game and was out lbw to Brydon Carse.
On Day 5, with India ending 135 runs with six wickets in hand, Jofra Archer and Ben Stokes landed telling blows in the first half-hour to suck the wind out of India's chase. Although Ravindra Jadeja showed a lot of fight with the tail in the second session, India lost the match by 22 runs.
‘Shubman Gill’s actions fired up England': Stuart Broad
Broad said Archer must have been fired up by what happened on Day 3. The only English bowler apart from James Anderson to take more than 600 Test wickets, Broad said he had never seen an England team so charged up.
"Archer is a hugely competitive character, raises his game for pressure scenarios, big scenarios. What would have fired him up in this game was the Indian team targeting Zak Crawley in that one over. We've talked about that. It was great fun. It was brilliant to watch. But he wouldn't have liked the fact that one of his players was out there on his own (Crawley) or with Ben Duckett, with the team going at him.
"I've never seen, I can't remember the last time I've seen this England team this verbal and all over. Archer, bowling a bouncer to Reddy, he ducks and bang! Everyone's around him, letting him know that he's here and he's under pressure. And that was ignited in the last over of day three. And it's brought a lovely edge to it," Broad said on Sky Sports.
The England great also credited captain Stokes for driving the energy. Stokes is leading that. Stokes is bowling, chatting, and saying, 'Come on, you're under pressure. We can see you. Come play a drive.' It's all that sort of mental energy that he's driving towards the Indian batters, trying to change their mindset, trying to put them off. And his team is following him," Broad added.
