Ravichandran Ashwin took a five-fer as England slumped to an innings defeat despite Jimmy Anderson claiming a 700th Test wicket
celebrated mountain goat status, England’s expedition ended in outright failure, a harrowing second avalanche of wickets at the hands of India’s majestic spinners turning a tour of missed opportunities into a full-blown 4-1 thumping.
Anderson deserved a bit better than this; better than the flurry of yahoos and general bamboozlement that passed as England’s final outing with the bat on tour. Only Joe Root looked a player still mentally present in India, not packed and ready for business class, his composed and professional 84 very much the outlier among the top seven.
But Ashwin, now up to 516 Test wickets in his career and with his young family cheering him on from the stands, has also sent down countless better spells for fewer rewards. On this occasion his victims threw themselves onto the pile – not that India, already assured of their 17th successive home series win, were not full value for the scoreline.Ben Stokes and his players will have to wear this one and who knows, possibly have some real conversations about who they are and what they want to be.
Enter Jonny Bairstow, chewing gum, instantly exchanging words with Shubman Gill regarding a comment on day two about Anderson retiring, but doing little to counter talk that he could be 100 caps and out himself. For the second time in an emotional match he went aerial, swatting three sixes off Ashwin to see Kuldeep swapped in, only for the wrist-spinner’s ripper of a fourth ball to trap him lbw on the back foot.
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