Playing yet another captain’s knock, Shubman Gill hit his third hundred in four innings to extend India’s lead to 484 at tea on the fourth day of the second Test against England on Saturday.
Gill shifted gears after the lunch break to rev up the scoring rate before completing his second hundred of the match just before tea. India scored 127 runs from 30 overs in the session. He reached his hundred with a single off Bashir in the second-last over before the tea break as India reached 304 for four in the second innings.
On the back of his double century in the first innings, Gill has become only the ninth batsman in Test cricket history to score a double century and a century in the same match. He also surpassed Sunil Gavaskar to score the most runs by an Indian in a Test match. Gavaskar had scored 344 runs in a Test match against the West Indies at Port of Spain in 1971.
Gill shared a 110-run stand with Rishabh Pant (65 off 58), who played some breathtaking strokes before he got out as he lost control of his bat while trying to send Shoaib Bashir’s delivery out of the park and ended up giving a simple catch to wicketkeeper Jamie Smith. While Gill was troubled by English bowlers in the morning session, he took it upon himself to take the attack back to the opposition camp in the second session. Josh Tongue tried a short ball against Gill at the start of the session, but he was happy to pull it over fine leg twice. The Indian captain was at his attacking best when Bashir was in action.
In the morning session, KL Rahul lost his middle stump to an excellent delivery from Tongue before Pant came on the scene and dominated the English bowlers with his aggressive batting, taking India to 177 for three at lunch.
The 13-over old ball was expected to do it trick in cloudy conditions and it worked for England pacers, especially Brydon Carse. Rahul (55 off 84) played some fluent cover drives before being undone by a sharp one from Tongue that straightened from an angle to uproot the middle stump. Karun Nair (26 off 46) was the first one to go on Saturday as he fell to Carse by nicking the ball into the safe hands of Jamie Smith. The tall and lanky Carse, who dismissed Nair with a snorter in the first innings, hit Nair’s grille with a nasty bouncer, leading to a concussion check.
Scoreboard: India 1st Innings: 587 England 1st Innings: 407 India 2nd innings (Overnight: 64/1 in 13 overs) Yashasvi Jaiswal lbw b Tongue 28 KL Rahul b Tongue 55 Karun Nair c Smith b Carse 26 Shubman Gill not out 100 Rishabh Pant c Duckett b Bashir 65 Ravindra Jadeja not out 25 Extras: 5 (b-1, lb-2, w-2) Total: 304/4 in 68 overs Fall of wickets: 1-51, 2-96, 3-126, 4-236 Bowling: Chris Woakes 12-3-39-0, Brydon Carse 12-2-56-1, Josh Tongue 15-2-93-2, Ben Stokes 7-1-26-0, Shoaib Bashir 18-1-74-1, Joe Root 4-1-13-0.
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