More than a decade back, Kevin Pietersen scored one of the great centuries by an overseas batsman in India, a gargantuan knock that sparked a dramatic turnaround in England’s fortunes. Having lost the first Test of four Tests in Ahmedabad in November 2012 by nine wickets, England had bowled India out for 327 in the first innings of the next game in Mumbai when Pietersen unleashed a memorable display of batsmanship against the turning ball.
Up against R. Ashwin, Pragyan Ojha and Harbhajan Singh, Pietersen danced his way to a magnificent 186 on a turner, 20 fours and four sixes studding his 233-ball masterpiece. It allowed England to open up a lead of 86, and there was no looking back thereafter with spinners Graeme Swann and Monty Panesar holding sway unchecked. England surged back to complete a 10-wicket win at the Wankhede on their way to an incredible 2-1 series triumph, India’s last series loss at home.
Ollie Pope trumped that Pietersen knock in grand fashion at the Rajiv Gandhi International Cricket Stadium in Hyderabad during a six-hour batting stint spread over two days. In the first of five Tests, England were well behind the eight-ball after the first-innings skirmishes, India ahead by 190 with their spin trio of Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja and Axar Patel working in the giant shadow of Jasprit Bumrah at the start of England’s second innings. When Ben Stokes, inspirational England captain, was dismissed midway through Saturday afternoon, the visitors were 163 for five, 27 shy of making India bat again.
By then, Pope had got his eye in. Having walked in at No. 3 in the 10th over with 45 on the board, the right-hander had eased to 60 in an already glorious exhibition of shot-making that was very much in tune with England’s attacking, high-risk approach to Test batting.
Easy on the eye and looking a million dollars when he drives in front of the stumps, the 26-year-old has taken to ‘Bazball’ with the same commitment as his colleagues, so it wasn’t surprising to see him uncork the reverse sweep with some regularity. That he played it with such fluency and authority on a surface that offered reasonable assistance to the spinners speaks to the hours put in at practice mastering a stroke that carries a high element of the unpredictable, even in the most docile conditions.
In so many ways, Pope might have been the least likely candidate to lead the English revival. He is rated highly back home, but just one half-century in 16 previous innings against India was anything but encouraging. Sachin Tendulkar had once likened Pope’s technique to Ian Bell, the former England batsman with 118 Test caps, but both Tendulkar and Bell would have been taken aback by the ferocity with which Pope attacked the Indian spin triumvirate.
Pope’s magnificent 196 – having lived by the reverse, he perished by it too, bowled by Bumrah, four short of his second double hundred – was notable not merely for its volume, but also for the ease and authoritativeness with which it came. During the course of his innings, he was able to get the lower order to perform above itself. With Ben Foakes, Rehan Ahmed and debutant Tom Hartley, respectively, he eked out stands of 112, 64 and 80 for the sixth, seventh and eight wickets, phases when India looked clueless and bereft of ideas as the runs flowed unchecked.
Also read: IND v ENG Test series: Why it's a matchup of Rohit Sharma and Ben Stokes' captaincy, too
From being the hunters, India rapidly became the hunted, their insipid body language providing a window to their scarred psyche. Shoulders drooped, heads dropped and they were almost resigned to their fate, waiting for the batsmen to commit mistakes rather than trying to induce errors. Seldom has the Indian bowling looked so lacklustre in home conditions; to lay the genesis of their woes at the Pope footstep will be no exaggeration.
The divine intervention the visitors had hoped for with their second innings in tatters came from the aptly surnamed Pope, around whom England have constructed their designs of an unlikely victory, overturning their 190-run disadvantage to a 230-run lead by the end of their second innings. England arrived in these lands with just two bowlers who had previously played Tests in India, and left out one of them, James Anderson, as they packed their side with spinners. The other, left-arm spinner Jack Leach, is only a bit player now, having hurt his knee while fielding on Friday.
That they are still in with a shout speaks to their resilience and their resolve, and their unshakeable faith in ‘Bazball’ that several felt would be badly exposed in India. If they have been competitive in the first Test, no one is more responsible for that than Pope, a star in the making who will be hard-pressed to produce a more impactful essay under pressure in tricky conditions for the rest of his Test career.
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