Pacers help India register a historic victory at Lord’s

Many had expected R Ashwin to be part of the Indian playing XI for the second Test at Lord’s especially after bowling all-rounder Shardul Thakur was ruled out due to an injury. However, Kohli decided to bring in Ishant Sharma and keep Jadeja in the XI.

And this decision to play with four pacers proved to be game-changing for India in the end. In England’s first innings, only Joe Root with his 180*, Jonny Bairstow with his 57 stood out. There were small contributions from Jos Buttler and Moeen Ali as well.

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But Mohammad Siraj picked 4/94, removing the top three of the England lineup. Ishant Sharma took 3 wickets including that of dangerous Buttler and Ali.

In the second innings, when India knew they had to bowl out England in under 60 overs and that England was reluctant to go for the victory, the onus was on Indian pacers to do the job and they came to the party early.

Shami and Bumrah after their batting heroics removed both the England openers for duck and the amazing performance continued. Ishant Sharma struck gold as he removed Jonny Bairstow for 2 runs, while Bumrah handed India the big fish Joe Root for 33 runs.

Mohammed Siraj was on fire, as he removed Jos Buttler, Moeen Ali, and Sam Curran in quick succession to ensure India had the match in their pocket and made the entire thing sweeter by taking the final wicket of James Anderson to wrap up a historic win for India.