This past week saw two Test matches being concluded. While one was concluded in a nail biting fashion, the other was a complete walkover. While the former hasn't brought up any major issues, the latter has alarm bells ringing and an emergency meeting being held to address the issues at hand.
England overcame India in the 3rd Test by 22 runs. India woke up in London looking for 135 runs. Instead, they ran into 21.5 overs of hell in the morning session. They had dished it out four years ago. England felt compelled to return the favour. And they didn't need to look as far back as the 2021 game to rouse themselves. There's been plenty of needle over the past three days, starting with Shubman Gill's irate response to their delay tactics and peaking with Mohammed Siraj's send-off to Ben Duckett.
Even the totally chill Jofra Archer couldn't help but get in Rishabh Pant's face after knocking back his off-stump. It was the third over of the day. He had just been smashed back down the ground, one-handed and it rubbed him just enough the wrong way that he began to pump his legs harder as he ran in. That extra effort meant the ball bit into the pitch that little bit extra and breezed past the outside edge to make friends with the off-stump, which couldn't help but do cartwheels.
Archer usually celebrates the wickets that means something to him by running off into the distance. The one he took in his first over of this, his first Test in four years, would have had him leaping into the crowd if not for Bashir's intervention. Here, he was starting to do so but quickly changed direction and ran up towards the retreating batter to fire off a few words.
England captain, Ben Stokes had demanded this. He wanted noise. He wanted belief. He wanted energy. He wanted India to feel trapped behind enemy lines. "Bang, bang," he'd said just a few minutes before the Pant dismissal and turned it into prophecy when he got rid of KL Rahul 18 balls later. He was on the floor appealing for lbw, every bit of him straining to convince umpire Sharfuddoula to lift the finger. He didn't. Immediately, he poured all of himself into figuring out a reason to review. Really there was only one thing he needed to know. Was height an issue? No, said Joe Root from the slips. He'd seen Rahul was well back in his crease.
The review confirmed Stokes' instincts. The ball was good. The movement down the slope was devilish. The impact was pad first. Hawkeye revealed three reds. Stokes pumped his fists. Many of the 24 281 people at the ground roared with him. Ten of them were right there beside him. His team-mates, who have seen him do impossible things and who believe they can do similar just because he says they can. That was the picture of this Test match. Stokes at the centre surrounded by the rest of England.
India lost three wickets for 11 runs in four overs. Ravindra Jadeja and Nitish Kumar Reddy were thrown into the fire and for a while they coped. The ball got soft. The runs came at a trickle. Efforts to rouse the crowd landed on the wrong set of ears as chants of "Indiaaaaaa! Indiaaa!" rang out. The eighth-wicket pair stitched a partnership of 30 runs in 89 balls and through it they resisted not just good bowling but their own base impulses.
"Not in the IPL," Harry Brook chirped at Reddy. "Jaddu's got to score them all." Stokes tried to engage him too, adding to his own workloads during that marathon spell by extending his follow through, but the India allrounder just calmly shook his head. "Not saying anything." It felt like the partnership had survived its biggest test and safety in the form of the lunch break was almost at hand.
That's when Chris Woakes arrived and turned the game on its head. Although his pace had dropped and England looked elsewhere when the day started, now they were grateful to their wizard for securing a crucial edge through to the keeper. Reddy, so solid when the ball was close to his body, flirting with a wider line and throwing his head back when the mistake led to his undoing. England walked off the field to resounding cheers.
Jadeja didn't lift up the anchor even though he only had the bowlers for company and was nearly made to regret it. He was given out lbw to Woakes in the 48th over, with India still 68 runs away. Though the on-field umpire had thumbs-upped the appeal, DRS had other ideas. Jadeja realised how close he had gotten to disaster and sent the next ball soaring into the stands behind midwicket. That, apparently, was nothing more than a little venting of the nerves. There would be no more boundaries for 11 overs as Jasprit Bumrah showed great resilience and Jadeja, trust in his plan. They were going to do it in singles, particularly off the fourth ball of every over. India's ninth-wicket partnership held England off for 131 deliveries - 53 of those faced with no trouble by Bumrah but the 54th became a problem.
Stokes again, in the sixth over of another Iron Man spell, went short. He had refrained from doing so previously because the pitch had gone to sleep and digging it in didn't seem to make sense. Now he was desperate enough to ignore the signs and just have a bit of faith. Bumrah invited the plan when he tried to hook a couple and missed, at which point Jadeja at the other end shook his head so disapprovingly, normal people would have just burst into tears. All this effort and you had to go and do that?
Bumrah didn't learn his lesson, though. He still went hooking and a top edge settled England's nerves and left India on the brink.
Stokes closed out the over and finally allowed his aura to fade and show some signs of exhaustion. He straight up forgot to pick up his cap from the umpire. He still continued to bowl though. He was still embedded in the fight, exhorting Archer to attack the ball at long-on, cheering Jamie Smith when he prevented a slower ball from sneaking past him, surging towards Ollie Pope when he thought he'd taken the match-winning catch at short leg, slipping under the lid at bat-pad. When what he had worked for finally happened, he just watched the rest of his team take off. He was too tired to join them. So they all came to him instead.
Yashasvi Jaiswal has the onus and the time to be India's next big opener. In 22 Tests, Jaiswal has scored 2 031 runs at an average of 50.77. He has already struck five centuries with his highest score being 214*. In the ongoing England vs India Test series, Jaiswal has already scored a century and a half-century. However, in the third Test, he could only return with low scores of 13 and 0. Robin Uthappa, member of the India's 2007 T20 World Cup winner, opined that Jaiswal looked confused.
"Yashasvi was genuinely just not comfortable from the word go. You know the first ball that he played, you know, it was like that it was a cut short ball and he would have been all over it, under normal circumstances and he just went there and then he like he kind of got stuck for a second and then he was like should I play? Should I not play and then he left it. Right. He's very decisive with his shot selection and that for me was like that doesn't doesn't look like a decent start. You could see through the over that he was confused, so to speak, not clear. Maybe not confused but just not clear as to how he wants to approach it. Because it was only 190 runs, I think he was half and half. It almost seemed like an afterthought, that shot," Uthappa said on his YouTube channel.
"He (Nair) left it at the point of delivery. I don't think he watched it coming in an made that decision as the ball came to him. Until that point, that dude was batting solid, man. He is batting so well."
Former Sri Lanka wicketkeeper-batter, Kumar Sangakkara, was also not impressed with Yashasvi Jaiswal's rusty seven-ball duck during India's pursuit of a 193-run target against England during the third Test at the 'Home of Cricket', Lord's.
Jaiswal appeared jaded and struggled to find his rhythm and eventually lost his wicket to tearaway Jofra Archer. With three slips, short leg and a gully, Archer delivered a sizzling 141kph delivery, banged in short outside off and forced a thick top-edge.
Sangakkara dissected the youngster's approach and said on Sky Sports, "Watching Jaiswal in the first over that he faced, he didn't look comfortable, he didn't look watchable. He has spent a long time at short leg for India, and he has come out looking a bit jaded."
The ball ballooned straight into the sky and landed safely into the gloves of wicketkeeper, Jamie Smith, as Jaiswal returned without troubling the scorers. Even in the first innings, Jaiswal perished against Archer and lost his wicket for 13.
India's assistant coach, Ryan ten Doeschate, on Thursday said the team is "leaning towards" playing lead pacer, Jasprit Bumrah, in the fourth Test in Manchester since the series is on the line but a final call will be taken close to the must-win game, starting 23 July. Speaking after India's only training session in Beckehham after the Lord's heartbreak, Doeschate said many factors will influence the call on Bumrah's participation. "We'll make that call in Manchester. We know we've got him for one of the last two tests. I think it's pretty obvious the series is on the line now in Manchester, so there will be a leaning towards playing him," said Doeschate.
"But again, we've got to look at all the factors. How many days of cricket are we going to get up there? What do we feel is our best chance of winning that game? And then how that fits in together with the Oval and looking at the last two games holistically as part of the series."
India will be reaching Manchester on 19 July. The assistant coach said the team remains in good spirits despite losing two Tests they were in a position to win. "That might be counter-intuitive when you're 2-1 down in the series. But we feel like the guys have been excellent for large parts of the series. The repetition of losing lots of wickets in a very short space of time has obviously been the key feature of the two losses."
"Probably both times in Headingley and obviously overnight and first thing in the morning at Lord's, we feel cost us the game was losing six wickets for 40 again. But if you look at it individually, if you look at the run tally of all the batters they're all batting nicely."
"Even someone like Karun, we feel his rhythm is good, his tempo is good. We want more runs from the three. But the message is mainly, let's really focus on what we've done well and tidy up the little things that have cost us results, essentially," Doeschate added.
As India trained at the Beckenham County Ground on a cloudy Thursday morning, after a two-day break, Kuldeep Yadav bowled to Karun Nair and Abhimanyu Easwaran in one of the nets for about an hour. Not at a stretch, but at frequent intervals.
Since landing in England nearly a month ago, this has been Kuldeep’s regime - turn up to train, bowl in the nets and then warm the bench as the morning of the match dawns. He had to wait in Leeds, then watch Washington Sundar being picked as second spinner alongside Ravindra Jadeja in Birmingham before the same duo was preferred at Lord’s. All the left-arm wrist spinner could do was train alone at the Nursery Ground in between the sessions.
Former Indian wicketkeeper-batter, Farokh Engineer, who has been a resident of Manchester for years and knows the conditions well, believes that India should bring Kuldeep in and leave Nitish Kumar Reddy out, while former England captain, Allan Lamb, has a slightly different take.
Knowing the Old Trafford surface inside and out, Lamb believes that Washington should make way for Kuldeep. "There’s one thing lacking in the Indian team. They do not have a (specialist) spinner. They have got to be playing Kuldeep. At Old Trafford, it does turn a bit, and I would have (played) him straightaway," Lamb told Sportstar.
In the last couple of games, India played Washington and Jadeja, keeping their all-round skills in mind and that paid off as the former claimed key wickets at Lord’s while the latter fought a lone battle with the bat in the second innings.
"Washington and Jadeja are all-rounders, but they are more focused on their batting, and I understand why India picked them because they were worried about their batting at the beginning. But now, that’s not the case. The decision to not play Kuldeep surprises me,” Lamb said.
Ever since making his Test debut in March 2017 against Australia in Dharamsala, Kuldeep has featured in just 13 matches across nine series but still bagged multiple Player of the Match awards. At home, he had to warm the bench due to the presence of Ravi Ashwin, Jadeja and Axar Patel for the longest time. On overseas tours, the team management’s decision to often play just one spinner meant either Jadeja or Ashwin made the cut.
With Ashwin retiring last December and Jasprit Bumrah not available for more than three games, there were chances of the team management using Kuldeep as the specialist spinner in the Anderson-Tendulkar Trophy.
However, that hasn’t been the case so far. While Kuldeep is not limited by the conditions and has the ability to provide breakthroughs at crucial junctures, the team management decided to look beyond him, possibly due to the flat nature of the surfaces in Leeds and Birmingham.
With the series on the line and the Old Trafford strip expected to aid the spinners a bit, it remains to be seen whether the team management finally brings Kuldeep into the side or not.
Karun Nair's outing in England has not been great. After three Tests at Headingley, Edgbaston and Lord's, Nair has tallied only 131 runs at an average of shade below 22. It isn't that Nair looked completely out of place in all three games, facing a total of 249 deliveries but there seemed to be a distinct problem when it came to handling quality pace and seam movement in tandem. It took eight years for Karun Nair to don an India jersey again but 25 days into his second coming in Test cricket, the Karnataka batter is facing a stern test.
"Probably both times in Headingley and obviously overnight and first thing in the morning at Lord's, we feel cost us the game was losing six wickets for 40 again. But if you look at it individually, if you look at the run tally of all the batters they're all batting nicely," he said.
"Even someone like Karun, we feel his rhythm is good, his tempo is good. We want more runs from the three. But the message is mainly, let's really focus on what we've done well and tidy up the little things that have cost us results, essentially," Ryan ten Doeschate added.
Batting at number three, India expect solidity from Nair, who gate-crashed into the national team after piling up a mountain of runs on the domestic circuit. With India trailing 2-1 in the five-match series and the next game still a week away, the management needs to take a call - stick to Nair or invest in the much younger Sai Sudharsan who got the rough end of the stick having been left out of the playing eleven after his debut game.
The elegant left-hander didn't do much wrong to be excluded and it was done to accommodate an extra batting option at number eight. Almost a month later, Nair was making way for the 23-year-old Sudharsan at Old Trafford could be the only change in the eleven as India look to level the series in the game starting 23 July.
Former India wicketkeeper, Deep Dasgupta, who is commentating on the series, says it may be time to bring back Sudharsan, who is more likely to return to England in four years' time than Nair. "You are still in it very much in the series so because even this Test match at Lord's was extremely close. It could have gone either way," he told PTI.
"But what I would be looking at is at number three. Would Karun Nair still continue or you want to invest in a young player like Sai Sudharsan who looked comfortable in the last innings that he played in that first Test match? He is young and investment for the future."
However, former India spinner, Anil Kumble, feels that Nair should retain his place in the side for the Manchester Test. "I don’t want to make too many changes because I think India have played a fantastic game. Yes, they lost by 22 runs. Unless injuries, we don’t know about Rishabh Pant," Kumble said on Follow The Blues. "He (Nair) certainly keeps his place. He did enough in the first innings. In the second innings, it was probably a brain fade, but he was batting well. That partnership was crucial"” he added.
Even before the third Test, however, former India batter, Sanjay Manjrekar, had said last week that he didn't align with the Indian team management’s thoughts around the batting order despite their comeback win against England at Edgbaston. He opined that dropping Sudharsan and playing Nair at no.3 wasn’t the way to go.
“There were some very interesting selections made in the last game, which I didn’t agree with. In the end, a win can put a cover on those decisions. I thought Sai Sudharsan, after just one match, to be left out considering he is a young player that we are looking at the future. He played pretty okay in the second innings. I’d like to stick with him but this team management is not afraid to chop and change depending on the vibe,” he had said on ESPNCricinfo.
“But I would like to see Sai Sudharsan at number three. Karun Nair is not a number-three player in my book. It is unfair to drop him after one Test if everyone is getting big hundreds. I think Sai deserves that opportunity as well,” Manjrekar had added.
It wasn't all good news for England. They were docked two World Test Championship (WTC) points and fined 10% of their match fees on Wednesday for their slow over rate in the third test against India at Lord's.
Meanwhile, West Indies were embarrasingly bowled all out for 27. There was a feeling that the stars had aligned for Mitchell Starc, playing his 100th Test with the pink ball he has so often dominated with but few could have imagined the carnage that unfolded on the third day at Sabina Park as he claimed three wickets in his first over and the quickest five-wicket haul in Test history; which included his 400th.
Yet, that wasn't the end of it. Scott Boland claimed a hat-trick, removing Justin Greaves, Shamar Joseph and Jomel Warrican, leaving West Indies 26-9 and in danger of equaling the lowest-ever Test total - made by New Zealand against England in 1955. They edged past it courtesy of a Sam Konstas misfield in the gully but only by one run when Starc ended the Test on the next ball to finish with a career-best 6-9. West Indies were all out in 14.3 overs.
Starc's incredible performance propelled Australia to a 176-run victory and a 3-0 series margin after they had set West Indies 204 for victory in another match dominated by the quick bowlers. Alzarri Joseph, with a career-best 5-27 and Shamar shared nine wickets as Australia's last four wickets fell for 22 runs but that was nothing compared to what followed.
Starc produced one of the great opening overs. He removed John Campbell first ball, the fourth time in his career he had struck with the opening delivery of an innings, when the left-handed edged a perfect outswinger to substitute wicketkeeper, Josh Inglis, who was standing in for the concussed Alex Carey.
Four balls later, Kevlon Anderson shouldered arms as the ball swung back to strike his shin in front of middle stump, yet he reviewed the plumbest of lbws. Next delivery, another one arched back between Brandon King's bat and pad to demolish the stumps. It was the sixth time in Test history that a team had been 0-3.
Mikyle Louis survived the hat-trick ball at the start of Starc's second over but fittingly his 400th wicket came with another trademark inswinger as he trapped Louis lbw, becoming the fourth Australian bowler to the landmark after Shane Warne, Glenn McGrath and Nathan Lyon.
The extraordinary scenes continued when, two balls later, Starc added Shai Hope lbw to bring up a five-wicket haul in just 15 deliveries, the fastest from the start of an innings - beating the previous record of jointly held by Ernie Toshack, Stuart Broad and Scott Boland by four deliveries.
Starc's monopoly ended when Josh Hazlewood had Roston Chase caught behind to leave West Indies on a scarcely believable 11-6. In the eighth over, Greaves became the first batter into double figures as he and Alzarri managed to reach the tea interval, which at one stage had been in doubt.
After the interval, Boland got into the act as Greaves edged to slip and Shamar was lbw via the DRS. Then, with the hat-trick delivery, he speared one through Warrican. Few would have bet against four-in-four but Starc ended with the honour of wrapping up one of the wildest passages of play imaginable.
The ball had dominated from the very start of the day when Cameron Green shouldered arms to one from Shamar, which shaped back to cannon into off stump. Green had played superbly the previous evening to give Australia a cushion for the fourth innings, although in the end they didn't come close to needing it.
Shamar took his series tally to 22 wickets at 14.95, the most for a West Indies bowler against Australia since Courtney Walsh in 1999 but not long later, there was only one quick bowler being talked about.
What wasn't surprising, as a result, were new records being made.
West Indies' total in the fourth innings of the third Test at Kingston against Australia is the second-lowest total in the history of Test cricket, only a run more than New Zealand's 26 all-out against England in 1955 at Auckland.
The 27 all-out is now the lowest total for West Indies in the format. Their previous lowest was 47 against England at the same venue in 2004. The 170 runs they aggregated across both innings are the lowest by West Indies in a Test match where they were bowled out twice. Their previous lowest was 175 against England at The Oval in 1957.
The overs batted by West Indies in their second innings is the third-shortest all-out innings in Test cricket, behind 12.3 overs by South Africa when they were all out for 30 against England in 1924 and 13.5 by Sri Lanka against South Africa last November.
There were seven ducks in the West Indies' second innings at Kingston. It's the first ever instance of seven batters getting out for a duck in a Test innings. There have been nine instances of six ducks previously, with the latest being at Edgbaston earlier this month.
Mitchell Starc needed 15 balls to complete his five-wicket haul in the second innings. It's the fastest five-for in men's Tests, a record he bettered by four balls. Ernie Toshack against India at Brisbane in 1947, Stuart Broad against Australia at Nottingham in 2015 and Scott Boland against England at the MCG in 2021; all completed their five-wicket hauls in 19 balls.
West Indies and Australia run aggregate in Kingston was 516, the seventh-fewest for a men's Test match and the lowest since 1910, where both teams were bowled out twice.
Only 1 045 balls were bowled across the four innings, the lowest for any Test with four all-out innings since 1910 and the fourth-fewest ever. It is also the third-shortest Test to not end in a draw in West Indies.
There are two bowlers to take three wickets in the first over of an innings in men's Tests since 2002. Irfan Pathan (India) did it before Starc, when he claimed a hat-trick in the opening over of the Karachi Test in 2006.
West Indies' innings started with a scoreline of 0-3, courtesy of Starc's opening over. It is only the sixth instance of a team losing their first three wickets without a run on the board in a Test innings.
Starc took two wickets in the first over of the fourth innings against West Indies in 2015 at the same venue. He is the only bowler to have taken multiple wickets in the first over of a Test innings twice since 2002.
6 runs were collectively added by West Indies' top six batters. It is comfortably the lowest by any team's top six in a men's Test innings and half of the previous lowest - 12 by Australia against England at Sydney in 1888.
Starc needed 19 062 balls bowled in Test cricket to claim his 400th wicket. He is the second quickest to that milestone by balls bowled, behind only Dale Steyn, who needed 16 634 balls.
Scott Boland became only the tenth bowler to take a hat-trick for Australia in men's Tests and the first since Peter Siddle against England at Brisbane in 2010. Australia now have 12 hat-tricks in men's Tests, only behind England's 15. Hugh Trumble and Thomas Matthews picked two hat-tricks each in their Test careers.
Starc's bowling figures at Kingston are now the best for a player in their 100th Test match. Muthiah Muralidaran's (Sri Lanka) 6-54 against Bangladesh in 2006 was the previous best.
Steven Smith's 48 in the first innings is the highest individual score of the match. The Kingston Test is only the 16th occasion in the men's Tests where no batter scored a fifty (Matches with at least two complete innings).
The previous such Test was between India and South Africa at Nagpur in 2015. Nine of the 16 Test matches without an individual fifty-plus score were played before 1900.
Stats supplied by ESPNCricinfo.
As a result of the embarrassment, an emergency meeting was held for the West Indies team. West Indies cricket chiefs have called an emergency meeting that will include former greats, Sir Vivian Richards, Sir Clive Lloyd and Brian Lara following their humiliating third Test defeat to Australia which saw them bowled out for 27.
The embarrassing collapse wrapped up a 3-0 series sweep for Australia. It prompted a statement from Cricket West Indies president, Kishore Shallow, on Tuesday, which said: "As an immediate step, I have advised the chair of the cricket strategy and officiating committee to convene an emergency meeting to review the recent Test series against Australia, particularly the final match."
"To strengthen the discussions, I have extended invitations to three of our greatest batsmen ever: Sir Clive Lloyd, Sir Vivian Richards, and Brian Lara. They will join past greats Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Desmond Haynes and Ian Bradshaw, who already serve on the committee."
Shallow's statement added: "This engagement is not ceremonial. These are men who helped define our golden eras. Their perspectives will be invaluable as we shape the next phase of our cricket development. We intend for this gathering to result in tangible, actionable recommendations."
Shallow acknowledged that the series result and especially the final match would lead to many "sleepless nights ahead" for fans and players but urged patience as they continue to rebuild the team. While disappointment is natural, we must not allow this moment to define our journey," he said.
"We are in a rebuilding phase, steadily investing in the next generation, and reigniting the spirit that has long made West Indies cricket a force in the world. The road ahead will test us, but I have faith in the talent and commitment of our players when they apply themselves."
West Indies were once the leading lights of Test cricket in the 1970s and 1980s, but they have since gone through a period of decline and currently rank eighth of 12 teams in the world rankings. They have struggled to field a consistent Test team in recent years with several players often prioritising lucrative franchise cricket over the longest format.
Clive Lloyd has said that "all aspects" of West Indian cricket needed to be examined after he was invited to be part of an emergency summit on the game following the Test team's 27 all out against Australia at Sabina Park.
"We have to examine all aspects of West Indies cricket from grassroots to the international level," Lloyd said in a statement provided to ESPNcricinfo. "Everything must be looked at closely and carefully. West Indies cricket is an institution. It has given so much to the people of this region and we must do all we can to revive it."
"I'm always available to help in any way. How we can marry the ideas we have with what is necessary and have healthy discussion on the way we move forward, that's what I'm thinking. It has been nearly 100 years since we have been playing top-class [Test] cricket and we have to get it right."
During the series, head coach, Daren Sammy, regularly addressed the side's batting challenges, with an indication they were attempting to score quicker if they struggle to bat time. However, Lloyd was of the view that they had to find ways to be able to build innings adding that pitches around the Caribbean needed to be addressed which has also been a topic raised by Sammy.
"We need a couple of Larry Gomes, more batsmen like him," Lloyd said. "We need batsmen who put a heavy price on their wickets and when they get in look to stay in. There is nothing wrong with digging in and 'batting ugly'. We have to find ways of fighting, occupying the crease, and staying in for long periods to wear down the bowlers. We have not been doing that.
"Obviously, the mental side of our game needs to improve. We have to go back to the basics. We have to look at schools' cricket, club cricket, first-class cricket - are we playing enough; we also have to look at the pitches - how are we preparing them and how they are playing."
CWI has recently commemorated 50 years since West Indies' 1975 ODI World Cup victory where Lloyd was captain and Player of the Match in the final his century against Australia.
They next face India in a two-Test tour of the sub-continent in October.