Ravindra Jadeja and Jasprit Bumrah sparked a dramatic collapse as India beat England by 157 runs to win the fourth Test at the Oval on Monday and take a 2-1 lead in the five-match series.
The tourists bounced back in style following their innings defeat in the third Test at Headingley and cannot now lose the series.
England, set 368 to win, were relatively well-placed at 141-2 after lunch on the last day but Jadeja and Bumrah both struck twice as England lost four wickets for six runs, slumping to 147-6.
There was no way back from there. England lost two more wickets before tea including captain and star batsman Joe Root, bidding for a fourth hundred in successive Tests, who played on to recalled all-rounder Shardul Thakur for 36.
Umesh Yadav, in for the dropped Mohammed Shami, then cleaned up the tail to the delight of India fans among a capacity crowd revelling in the south London sunshine.
Yadav, who took six wickets in the match, ended proceedings when he had James Anderson caught behind off the new ball shortly after tea.
England have little time to regroup before the fifth Test at Old Trafford starts on Friday.
India’s victory came 50 years on from their first Test — and series — win in England at the Oval in 1971.
Left-arm spinner Jadeja, again preferred to star off-break bowler Ravichandran Ashwin, was eventually rewarded for a probing spell on a wearing pitch.
Haseeb Hameed, 43 not out overnight, added just 20 more runs in 108 balls on Monday.
Jadeja pierced his defense with a delivery that pitched just outside leg stump and turned to clip the top of the opener’s off stump.
Ollie Pope, who made 81 in the first innings, was bowled for two by Bumrah giving the fast bowler, gaining significant reverse swing, his 100th Test wicket.
Bumrah then took his second wicket in five deliveries when a brilliant yorker clean bowled Jonny Bairstow for a duck.
Ali was powerless to prevent further collapse, the all-rounder also falling for nought when he deflected a Jadeja delivery that turned and bounced out of the rough straight to short leg.
England had earlier resumed on 77-0, with Rory Burns 31 not out.
History, however, was against the home team as the most they have made to win in the fourth innings of a Test is 362-9, requiring 359, against Australia at Headingley in 2019.
Burns and Hameed had denied India an early breakthrough Sunday after the tourists had piled up 466 in their second innings, with player of the match Rohit Sharma scoring 127 — his first Test century outside of India.
Yadav and Bumrah opened the attack on Monday, with the pair both bowling a significantly fuller length and straighter line than on Sunday.
However, it was all-rounder Thakur — playing in his first Test since suffering a hamstring injury in the drawn series opener in Nottingham — who ended the opening stand.
With just his fourth ball of the innings, and one delivery after Burns had completed a fifty to take England to 100, Thakur’s excellent leg-cutter to the left-hander took the outside edge and was caught by wicketkeeper Rishabh Pant.
Hameed completed a 123-ball fifty — his fourth in five Tests — before he mistimed a needless slog-sweep off Jadeja only for Mohammed Siraj to drop a routine catch at mid-on.
But Dawid Malan, slow to respond to Hameed’s call, was run out for five by substitute fielder Mayank Agarwal’s throw from cover to Pant.
Source: Arab News
BDST: 1247 HRS, SEP 07, 2021
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