India extended their lead to 244 runs with nine wickets in hand at stumps on Day 3.
England’s middle-order mainstay Harry Brook has backed his team to chase down any total set by India in the ongoing second Test at Edgbaston.
After gaining a huge first-innings lead of 180 runs, the visitors ended the third day at 64/1, extending their lead to 244 runs with nine wickets in hand.
“I still think we can win this Test match, to be honest. I believe if we take a couple of early wickets tomorrow and put them under pressure and hopefully they can crumble up there and everybody knows in the world that we are going to try and chase whatever they set us, so we’ll see how they play,” said Brook to BBC.
In reply to India’s first innings total of 587, England were reeling at 84/5 before a stunning 303-run stand between Harry Brook (158) and Jamie Smith (184*) brought the hosts back into the game.
However, once the marathon partnership was broken, England suffered another collapse to be bowled out for 407.
“It was nice to spend some time out there with Smudge [Jamie Smith]. He has a long England career ahead of him. Hopefully we’ve clawed ourselves back in the game. He played phenomenally well there. He put all the momentum back in our favour,” said Brook.
“If I hadn’t got out we would not be in this situation now but we saw last week how quickly it can change. Akash and Siraj bowled well. They attacked the stumps with all modes of dismissal in play,” he added.
Before the close of play on Day 3, Yashasvi Jaiswal was dismissed for 28 while KL Rahul (28) and Karun Nair (7) stayed unbeaten.
“Thankfully we’ve seen the back of Jaiswal and hopefully we can make inroads tomorrow. India are in the driving seat but hopefully we can put pressure with early wickets and make them crumble,” Brook remarked.