England captain Ben Stokes tipped the 28-run win at Hyderabad in the opening Test against India as the greatest triumph under his captaincy. The visitors had their backs against the wall after India took a massive lead of 190 runs in the first innings.
However, England bounced back into the contest with Ollie Pope scoring a masterclass knock of 196 runs. Pope’s 196 is the highest for England in the second innings against India in India. Furthermore, Pope’s knock of 196 was also the fourth-highest individual score by a visiting batter in India in the second innings of a Test match.
England went on to post 420 runs in the second innings and took a lead of 230 runs. Subsequently, India was bundled out for 202 after debutant Tom Hartley registered fine figures of 7-62. Hartley registered fourth-best figures by a visiting bowler in India as a debutant.
Under Ben Stokes, England has won 14 out of the 19 Test matches but the English skipper ranks the Hyderabad win as the best he has had in his stint.
Ben Stokes revealed he observed Rohit Sharma’s captaincy in the first innings and how the Indian spinners bowled and tried to guide his team on the right track.
Ben Stokes said in the post-match presentation, “Since I have taken the captaincy on, we have had a lot of fantastic moments as a team. We’ve got a lot of great victories, we’ve been part of some amazing games. Where we are and who were playing against, this victory is probably, 100% definitely, our greatest triumph. It’s my first time coming out here being a captain. I am a great observer of the game. I learned a lot from our first innings in the field. I watched how Indian spinners operated, how Rohit set the field and tried to take a lot of that into our innings.”
Stokes hailed Ollie Pope’s knock as the right-hander scored a majestic innings of 196 runs to help England get past the 400-run mark.
Stokes added, “The situation we found ourselves in, coming in at No. 3, the shots he played, 190 on such a difficult wicket, he was able to manipulate the field with sweep shots and reverse-sweeps, the way he was able to rotate the strike, I think that’s the greatest innings that’s ever been played in subcontinent by an English batsman. If you lose, you wake up in the morning, you’re still having a good crack at life, still breathing, got another four games after this. I don’t fear failure, all I want to do is try and encourage whoever finds themselves lucky enough to be in this squad.”
The second Test match between India and England will be played at Dr. Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy ACA-VDCA Cricket Stadium, Visakhapatnam from 2nd February.
