Buttler takes England to 400; Indian spinners take all 10 wickets

Indian spinners continued to torment England, picking up all the ten wickets of the innings. Ravichandran Ashwin (six for 112) and Ravindra Jadeja (four for 109) made full use of the spin and bounce on offer at the Wankhede. However, it wasn’t a bad outing for the visitors, whose total of 400 is nearly 80 runs more than the average first innings score at the venue.

Jos Buttler’s gritty 76 powered the visitors who resumed at 288/5 on Day 2.

England lost the hard-hitting Ben Stokes on 31 just few overs into the day. Chris Woakes’ (11) stay was cut short by a sharp spinning delivery from Ravindra Jadeja, who opened the bowling with Ashwin. The all-rounder’s defensive prod induced a faint edge that Parthiv Patel pocketed with ease. A few overs later, he sent Adil Rasheed (4) back with an arm-ball.

The 26-year-old Buttler notched up his sixth half century in 106 balls. The wicketkeeper-batsman held the lower order together, even as they nudged and struggled to cope against the spin trio of Ashwin, Jadeja and Jayant Yadav.

However, just when things started to look downhill for England, the lanky Jake Ball and Jos Buttler stitched together a crucial partnership of 51, showing some obdurate defence and the ability to keep the scoreboard ticking.

With the wicket increasingly favouring the spinners and crumbling, India would look to bundle out the opposition quickly.  The average first innings total at the Wankhede is 321.

 

SOURCE: PTI