1st Test, Day 2: England reach 107/1 at tea after Gill’s sparkling hundred and Bumrah’s magic

Jasprit Bumrah produced a moment of pure magic after skipper Shubman Gill and Rishabh Pant unfurled remarkable hundreds, but England showed spunk to reach 107 for one at tea against India on the second day of the first Test here on Saturday.

Ben Duckett (53) and Ollie Pope (48) were at crease at the break after adding 103 runs for the second wicket as the home side now trail India’s first innings total of 471 by 364 runs.

England needed a strong start but Bumrah made it impossible with a zippy first spell under grey skies in which he consumed opener Zak Crawley (4).

It was a wonderful exhibition of fast bowling and Crawley never looked settled, producing edges in his first three balls, and the fourth one proved lethal. The delivery took the outside edge of the right-hander’s bat, grazed on his thigh pad and eventually nestled in Karun Nair’s hands at first slip.

Ben Duckett had immense fortune too as he was dropped by Ravindra Jadeja at backward point off Bumrah when the batter was on 15.

However, the pressure Bumrah created from one end could not be sustained by his new ball partner Mohammed Siraj, who gave away far too many freebies.

Third seamer Prasidh Krishna, a hard length bowler, too erred while trying to find that fuller Leeds length, giving ample space for batters to free their arms.

Duckett and Pope were too vigilant to miss those opportunities as England scored close to five runs an over after rain held up their start for a while in the post-lunch session.

Earlier, Pant (134) made a brilliant hundred, while skipper Shubman Gill (147) carved his highest Test score but spirited England bowlers managed to grab seven Indian wickets for 112 runs across two sessions to limit them to 471.

India resumed the day from 359 for three.

Pant, who started the day on 65, took over the mantle from Gill, who was happy to cede the majority of the strike to his partner.

The left-hander, who milked 209 runs for the fourth wicket with Gill, was at his entertaining best, starting his cavalier ways with a stunning falling paddle off spinner Bashir behind stumper Jamie Smith, a la West Indian legend Rohan Kanhai.

Smith was in action a little later when he missed a simple stumping chance off Bashir, to get rid of Pant when the batter was at 124.

But by that time, Pant had stamped his authority on the game in his inimitable way and Bashir bore the full force of his innovative fury.

A six over mid-wicket carried him to 94, and the 90s is a rather troubled territory for Pant as he was dismissed seven times in Tests on that score in his career.

So, it was not really surprising to see him taking singles until he reached 99.

Pant then decided not to waste too much time, and summoned that one-handed six off Bashir to go past the 100-run mark for the seventh time in his career.

In doing so, he also overtook former captain MS Dhoni (6 centuries) in scoring the most number of hundreds by any Indian wicketkeeper in Tests.

It was also a moment of redemption for Pant as Gavaskar had slammed his shot selection during the tour to Australia with the stinging remark “stupid, stupid, stupid.”

But on this day, the legendary batter atoned for it with the exclamation of “superb, superb, superb!” on air.

However, the dismissals of Pant and Gill gave England the opening they were looking for and they crashed through the door.