India vs England: Axar Patel uproots Jonny Bairstow with peach of a delivery

India is up against England for the 3rd match of the four-match Test series. The game is already levelled 1-1 before the action got underway for the pink ball Test at the world’s largest cricket stadium. It looked like both the skippers were keen to get their hands on toss, but it was visiting skipper Joe Root who had his day, and he decided to take on the field with willow first.

Though India didn’t get the toss in its favour, they had quite a great start with the bowling attack. Firstly, Dom Sibley was caught by veteran pacer Ishant Sharma who is up for his 100th Test match today. The second wicket didn’t wait for too much, and it was Axar Patel who bagged success on the first ball of his spell.

The local boy came up with all the confidence owing to his class performance in the last Test in Chennai. It was Jonny Bairstow on the crease, and Patel caught him on his golden delivery. Bairstow came up for his first match of the series and had to return without any run in his account. He turned his head outside off stump and created a space between his leg and his bat, and this where Patel caught him plumb.

Here is Axar’s golden delivery

That’s plumb I’m afraid Jonny #INDvENG pic.twitter.com/ErjgG45lPH

— simon hughes (@theanalyst) February 24, 2021

India got off to a great start

Currently, skipper Joe Root and Zak Crawley are up on the crease, and England is playing at 30 runs with the loss of two wickets in 9.3 overs. Crawley has picked up the pace well enough and is batting with 23 runs under his belt, which came through some classy boundaries. The result of the match becomes very important keeping in mind the scenarios of the World Test Championship. The finals will be played at iconic Lord’s, and New Zealand have already locked their seat as one of the finalists.

India is playing with two changes in this match where the local boy and class pacer Jasprit Bumrah is back to the squad. On the other hand, Washington Sundar is back in the squad in place of Kuldeep Yadav.