Test Match Special - 15 wickets fall on day two in Chennai

Episode Date: February 14, 2021

Jonathan Agnew is joined by former England captains Michael Vaughan and Sir Alastair Cook to discuss a dominant day for India in Chennai. Plus, we hear from Graham Thorpe.

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podcast from BBC Radio 5 Live. Hello, I'm Jonathan Agnew. Welcome to the Test Match Special podcast. England have suffered a chastening day in Chennai, having been bowled out for 134. India closed on 54 for 1. That's a lead of 249. Coming up, we'll hear from Michael Vaughn.

We'll see whether Prakash Wakanke will finally concede that India are on top in this game. And we'll hear a fascinating chat with Sir Alistair Cook or just how you approach batting on a wicket like this. So close of play of the second day of the second test between India and England and Chennai sees India absolutely tightening their grip on this match. They've closed their second innings at 54 for one. They lead therefore by 249. It's immense on this pitch.

Gill was the man out, but Sharma's still there on 25, Pajara on 7 this morning. India lost the last four wickets for 29 in six overs, bowled out for 3.29. couple of tickets ever stone actually who bowled very well i think given the circumstances three for 47 he finished with england were then bowled out for 134 burns got nought sibley 16 Lawrence nine joe root fell sweeping for six stokes 18 a totally unplayable delivery a lovely partnership between pope and folks actually came to an end after a lot of concentration pope very unluckily hit syrarch just glanced it down the leg side of a loosener from the quick bowers his first ball punt took a brilliant catch Pope was out for 22 Mowing for 6

Olly Stone for 1 Jack Leach 5 An ugly moe from Stuart Broad finished it off He was bold for naught Leaving Benfokes On 42 not out And played very well

To Ashwin taking 5 for 43 And then in go India again Gill was Elberdow is a leach For 14 54 for 1 Therefore is the close of play Score Lots of talk about the pitch

A lot of talk about the third umpire Who's, I must say Given all the technology that he's got available is not simply making decisions wrong but he isn't actually even allowing the decisions to be ruled upon he's not actually running the replays through if we've seen now

so there's a lot of stuff going on we've seen Joe Root getting a little bit heated with the umpires out in the middle who I think are doing a reasonable job to be honest but he's got no one else to have a bit of a go at but it does demonstrate Michael Vaughn there's some frustration starting to build I think

yeah and this is where Joe Root's got to be careful I'm sure the likes of Chris Silverwood and Graham thought lots of experience there, particularly from Graham Thorpe of playing and being in this kind of situation where you feel that everything's going against you. I think Joe's got to understand

that over the two days, his team have got the wrong end of the decisions and the wrong end of the conditions, but India have played better. They've played better this week. They've played a brand of cricket that's very intimidating. In Ravi Ashwin, they've got the best spinner by a good distance over

the two teams. Aksa Patel and you've called the Yadav. You've got Siraj. you've got Isshanth Sharma, so it's a good pace attack for this kind of wicket. And in Roe, it's Sharma, a world-class performer that's delivered an individual score that's put India on top in the game. And, you know, I think this is where, as an England captain, you've just got to go back to the hotel, sit down and go, okay, we've just got to try and fight

for however long this game lasts, just keep fighting. You never know, you know, someone could do something remarkable. It looks like England will obviously lose the game, but, you know, try and take something over the course of the next day and a half into that third test match, but don't get too demoralised because you know you've mentioned this pitch is a stinker for test match cricket over five days

it's not a pitch that's been prepared to last that long I don't mind the ball spinning I actually really enjoy watching it and I've enjoyed watching today it's entertaining but you know when you're seeing that amount of dust and that amount of kind of it is like batting on the beach

and it's grown and grown and grown it over the course of two probably that was as simple as that isn't I mean and there's people out there say it's the same for both sides it's turned from ball one. Yes, it did, but it's not turned from ball one like it's turning now. So winning the toss is a massive advantage. And as it was in the first game, but, you know, I thought in the first test match of India had a batty properly in the first innings that I'd drawn that game.

It was because they batted badly in that first innings. Whereas this pitch, as you said, this isn't prepared properly for a five-day test match wicket. It's a real poor cricket wicket. And India of maximise what they have in front of them and played some good cricket, particularly with the bat in hand to get that amount of runs on that kind of surface was a good effort and in Ravi Ash

we saw him get six for in the first test he's got another fifer now I'm pretty sure he might get another couple of fifers before the end of the series and just going back to Root again for a moment I mean I reckon there's been three incidents now where the third umpah

hasn't really done his job and so you know you're right you've got to get that out of your mind haven't you because you start you can get consumed on these tours and we talked about it actually when they moved from

Sri Lanka, India, if we're honest, I don't think expecting them to win the first test as they did, and the danger of getting a bit of siege mentality or in the bubble and everything else, you can quickly get into this frame of mind that everything and the whole world is against you. And somehow, they've got to get that out of their minds. Yeah, and I think that's what India like. You know, they like to get the opposing captain into that kind of mindset because you know there's a negativity. There's that seed of doubt that you've thrown into the opposing captain's mind that things are going against you. So Joe's got to

get back to that hotel tonight, as I said, speak to some of the senior coaching members. Understand it is what it is. India have played better over the two days. There's no point in coming out criticizing the pitch. That'll sound like a saga. We can do that. We can talk on behalf of everyone.

I mean, we're cricket fans at the end of the day and we can see when things are not right. Let's be honest, over the years. England have prepared some wickets that we've looked at and gone, oh, lots of about that. Yeah, and we've been critical of it.

And you want the varying conditions around the world because that's what's so wonderful about test cricket. You know, you can have your bland one-day pitches

that's the same in Auckland as they are in Sydney and the same in Barbados. You can have all that with a white ball, but test cricket's different and you do get a

flavour of wherever you are in the world. However, you've got to have a reasonable contest and the ball should spin in India, of course, I mean

Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, but not exploding through the surface of a pitch like this and making batting a lottery that's not what test cricket is yeah I mean it's that fine balance isn't it that I thought in the first test match the pitch was too flat for too long

and then it exploded almost too quickly it didn't kind of just deteriorate over a longer period of time whereas this one it is done too much too soon and yeah it is a fine balance you expect it to spin you expect foot holes to arrive on days two three and in Ravi Ashwin you know that

whatever the conditions are it's going to be difficult because they're such a wonderful spin bowler but you know when you see that it's clear that they've they've not prepared an end and it's both ends that are doing it but particularly one end yeah and i would suggest it's probably the end that they knew that ravi afshadshadry was going to be bowling from they thought there's a nice patch for ravi just give it a scrub which is home conditions you are allowed to do that it's your home advantage but um you know i do like to see pictures prepared that potentially at least look like they're going to last four days or so And in the ICC's interest, this is the year of the World Test Championship, and I can't, I've been through the regulations,

it must be in the ICC's interest to make sure that actually, you know, if any deliberate preparation of pitches, and not saying this one is, there should be sanctioned, there should be points deducted, because you don't want situations where teams trying to get in the final are just producing absolutely minefields to get there. That's not in the ICC's interest. This is their flagship competition, there's test cricket's world championship. and they should put into place some sort of mechanism that makes sure that can't happen. Well, and all that's going to... And also, I guess look at the teams

that are travelling around the world, they're not getting the three or four day games leading into a series. So, you know, it makes it almost doubly bad. What will happen, and we know it's going to happen, England will play five test matches against India in the summer in England, and it's just going to hoop around all over the place.

And I won't be in favour of that either, because I want fair balance between that. We thought, what is going on here? In fact, England lost it, but he's got their fingers burned. But you shouldn't, it just needs to be a fair balance. And sometimes groundsmen get it wrong. And they make a genuine mistake. And that's, you know, that's fair enough.

We all make mistakes. But anyway, let's see how the rest of the series pans out as far as these pictures are concerned. I love the way Pope and folks both went about it this afternoon, though. Both showing that, you know, they're busy, there is a way. You're trying to adapt your own technique. Folks we know can bat in these conditions. but that was encouraging anyway. Yeah, I mean, you're looking at different scenarios going for.

I mean, Benfos is, you know, I know he's only played a few games, but it looks to me like the best wicketkeeper in the world. You know, it just looks like he makes wicketkeeping look so easy. It just melts into his gloves. And with the batting hand today, he just, you know, he plays spin well. We know that from his time playing in Sri Lanka a few years ago when he got that terrific 100.

So he knows he's a good player of spin. You know, I just wonder down. the track, you know, with all these bat, would put the potentialist players of batsmen and folks with a wicket-keeper batsman. Dan Lawrence has struggled at three. Will it be Zach Crawley that comes in for three? Will Johnny Bester come into the next test match at number three?

Or will they think, Olly Pope at number three? I mean, there's so many options that England are fine. But when you see a keeper like Ben, folks, and someone that batted so away, he said, oh, he's such a good player. Yeah. You almost want 12, don't you? And you want folks to kind of go out there and keep when the spinners are

I mean, Butler's keeping's been very, very good as well in the last year. So it is tricky, but when you see a player play so well over the course of two days back into the test match in tough conditions, you think, oh, mine's seen a bit more of that. And it's the last one. You sometimes get this, and we've all been there, for bowlers out there listening now, who have just searched and searched and searched for a wicket, and you can't get it, and you get more and more frustrated, I would urge you to watch the dismissal of Ishant Sharma to moeing

which just makes you you can only do it the smile on your face you know it was a horrible loathal toss of a pie that he managed somehow to tow end

to midwicked for a duck it was I mean it was it was so funny wasn't it and you know the matter of cricket we've all played and watch

it just shows every now and then even at the highest level you get something like that well I reckon there's a little DVD that the England Nospinists

could produce over the course of the last three tests. If you think back to some of the dismissals Dominic Bess got in Sri Lanka in that first thing, when he got a Pfeiffer in Gaul. Now Mowin Ali's picked up, if you look at Dominic Bess getting

Pajara caught off the back of short leg in the first test here. Moin Ali with the sham of this summer. The England off spinet catch and root it. Yeah extra cover, flying one-handed. The England off spinners they've got a bit of fortune going their way

at the minute. Long may that continue. Thank you, Michael. We'll catch up with you tomorrow and Michael Vaughn of course giving his thoughts on proceedings we'll be dialing up Puna in a second to get hold of Prakash Wakanka to get an Indian view of things which would be interesting to hear first of all

a little closer to home we're going down to the stats shed in Streatham where we're going to find Andy Zaltzman pouring over all sorts of factors I'm not sure what necessarily what's caught your eagle eye today Andy well where else to start agers but with an all-time

test match records set today in India's score of 329 not a single extra the highest team score in the history of test cricket around at 2,400 games the highest score ever made without a single run

from extras. Not a bind or a leg bind or not a nothing. Nothing so good discipline from the bowlers no no balls we've seen quite a lot of them in the first test and folks has let a couple of buys through in the second nings but basically flawless in the first innings. Also got a stumping and a couple of

catches this morning was the fifth longest innings ever played without an extra and the longest since 1962. Slightly less good for England. Obviously, they're batting. Rory Burns now out three times in the last five balls he's faced in this series.

He's got a second innings duck in the first test and a duck here. And since the start of the Pakistan series in the summary, he's had scores of 410, 06, 33, naught and naught. So that's a concern for England. We talk about Zach Crawley coming back. I guess it could be that, you know,

and potentially Bear Stowe they could possibly both come into the top three for the next test Burns his last eight tests in all averaging just under 24 Joe Root was out sweeping a left arm spinner for the first time in four years since then he scored 216 runs

with the sweep against left arm spin without being dismissed so a very rare failure for him out for six his lowest first inning score of the winter so far by a factor of 180 runs runs. So that was a major wicket, Axe Appetel's first test wicket. Ollie Stone picked up three wickets. Here's a curious one, Agers. He's only the second England bowler to take three or more wickets in his first two test innings in the last

23 years. And the other was Toby Roland Jones, who had five and three on debut against South Africa. And you've got to go back to Dean Hedley before that for an England test bowler with three or more in both innings. Stone had three on debut against Ireland. And bowled very for three wickets here. Moin Alley, four wickets, 52 in his last 11 tests. Only Graham, Swan and Derek Underwood have had faster 50 wicket sequences amongst England's spinners in the last 60 years, ominously for England. Only once ever as a team chased a target of more than 280 to win in India, and that Indian lead already up around 250. And I'll give you a quick update from the Bangladesh West Indies test that we've been following. It's been a captivating season. West Indies had a brilliant win in the first test and they've just won the second test for a 2-0 series victory by the narrow margin of 17 runs, the final wickets. Jamel Warakan had Mehdi Hassan caught out for 31

by Rakeem Cornwall who took four wickets and three catches in the fourth inning. So a fine series victory for West Indies in two dramatic games. Yeah, a number of senior players pulled out to I was thinking of the West Indies and how they'll look at that. And of course, last summer they brought a lot of their second team over, didn't they? Their A team and so on to just get used to being in the bubble and test cricket life and so on.

And actually, I think we said at the time, this will do a lot of these young players a bit of good. And with so many senior players opting out of Bangladesh, that seems to be the case. Yeah, so Jason Holder big one of them, their captain, it's been such a superb player for them over the last few years. and a great leader for them. Amongst the players who've come in, and Krummer Bonner, who helped Kyle Mayers, as Mayors made that incredible double hundred

in the fourth innings of the first essence. Bonner made an 80-od in that game, 90, and a valuable 38 in a low second innings here. Joshua DeSilver, who he saw coming on as a subkeeper against England in the summer. I remember him running, sprinting back to his hotel room to get his keeping pads when Shane Dowrich got injured. He's had a good series with the bat.

A couple of good scores made. 92 in this second test. Alzari Joseph scored at 80 down the order. Wickets for Cornwall who also was on that tour, played the one test without success in England. So it's a superb win for West Indies. Bangladesh had been much

tougher to beat at home in the last few years. The first of them they've been whitewashed in the series at home since West Indies did so in 2012. So it's a, yeah, it's a been a fascinating two-match series to follow, albeit I've only been following it by looking at the scores, ticking over on the internet. That's the wonders of test

cricket. Indeed. Andy, thank you so much. Lots of interesting stats in there. As always, of course, it's not all what Test cricket's about, but it certainly makes a big part of it, and it's great when you sort of get putting some flesh on the bones, as it were. Let's head off to India then, and to get the views

of Prakash Warkhankar, after a bit of a lively day, Prakash, lots going on and off the field. There's lots of talk about the pitch, lots of talk about the third umpire and so on. How are you feeling the heat there in Puna? Well, certainly, yes, we are. And I'm actually, to be hand-on heart, I guess. I'm a little disappointed, particularly with the last 20 minutes or so of play,

because, you know, the third empire, I think, you know, in this case, I want to understand from you as much as anyone else, that LBW appeal of Moin against Rohit Sharma, was it the field empire judging that he was attempting to play a stroke, which is why they didn't do the ball tracking? Because otherwise, that looked out when we saw the review later on, didn't we? Absolutely. Well, it's for the third umpire to sort of assess these decisions from the word go, isn't it?

I mean, I think what England supporters are saying is it's now been possibly three, definitely two, but possibly three mistakes made by the third umpire, but it shouldn't happen. He's got all the equipment. Absolutely. I couldn't agree with you more. I think Roy Cherma is making it a habit of giving the, centralizing situations with stumping so we can agree to say that okay maybe there's some doubt there but why would you not review an appeal for leg before when the clearly in my mind

the back was hidden behind the pad and a stroke was not attempted i mean that that's completely idiotic it just takes the sheen off i think uh not necessarily from the indian cricket team because the umpires have nothing to do in that sense with the team a terrific bowling effort really one solid batting performance wasn't it by Ben folks how well he batted and applied himself and maybe the rest of the England batsman could have taken a leave or two out of that and Ravi Ashwin once again just coming out and bowling beautifully

but this just leaves the sour taste at the end of the day which is so unnecessary in an otherwise fantastic day of test match cricket yeah and I completely agree with you because in the conversations about the pitch and the lack of preparation and so on what in a way what an Indian followers I don't think is any sort of added

controversy about the third umpire and it sort of weakens any argument that you might have about the pitch and I'm I don't know what you think about the pitch but I suspect you'd put up a stronger defence of the pitch than England supporters would do

I suspect I would and you know me well enough now I guess to know that I'm not I would like to believe that I'm not overtly partisan the fact of the matter is we had 330 run scored. We had

someone scored 160 2 or 350s and I think Ben Fox's knock was well worth more than what he had. If he had a chance, I think you would have got a few more for sure. So I think it's a pitch on which if you battle and play with the right kind of technique

and you have your bit share of luck which is obviously very, very essential, you can put up resistance. It's not that this is a bad pitch. Everyone's been following the Shane Warren, Michael Vaughan discussion on Twitter with two different points of view

but at the end of the day if a site gets bowled out for a hundred on a green top somebody will argue that that was very alien conditions for a visiting team I think it's the same here could it have been a little bit better maybe it could have should it have

probably should have would it have changed the result of India had won the toss I doubt very much I think it would have been in a similar but would have given the opposition or the visiting team probably a greater chance of a fight back than up here as possible now. Well, I do agree with you.

And I was going to say, what a slightly scratchy phone line, Prakash, I was going to say that, I mean, the doubts that we had about India turning up for the first match, there's no doubt they've come roaring in for this second one. Yeah, they certainly have. And I think you can see it in the body language. You know, I can't remember when the last time Virat Koli hugged Ravichandran Ashwin the way he did after he took that catch I think it was for the second

English wicket that fell there's clearly a lot more bonhomie nothing brings people together as a crisis does it in life or in cricket and I think the Indian team just rallied together

and have come out in all guns blazing and I think England a little bit have been just blown away I'd like to say in spite of that very very good batting effort from Benforks I really think

he batted superbly Many thanks Prakash well the challenge for England today has been how you bat on a minefield. There aren't many Englishmen who have got a better record in this sort of thing than Sir Alastair Cook. The first thing I have to say, I don't think I've played

on a pitch quite as inconsistent with the bounce as this. I've played on a pitch who have turned as much as this. That Mumbai pitch would have turned unless my memory is like slightly, as always slightly tinted from looking back thinking it was a lot hard and it actually was well I'm pretty sure it

spun big but it didn't have the inconsistent bounce. The challenge on this wicket is the fact that if it hits the patch is almost your it's a lottery of what it does out of that patch so the mindset if i was then batting in that first innings i it would be i would have to go right what are my attacking options to each to batsman each bowler what was my one shot i could play to try if the ball is in the area to push a little bit of pressure back on the bowler so the left arm was bowling even though he's a tall left armor i would and bowling draft, I'd have to, I'd be batting on off, slightly on off stump, and looking to

sweep straight away, looking for that sweet, get my pad outside the line, and that'll be my shot to get some pressure back on him, and hopefully then by sweeping him, he might start missing his length, give me a cut, or give me a clip on the leg side. I'd imagine he'd their bowl straight with the leg slip like Judeasia did to me, which I found, you know, find quite hard, because it's quite a natural thing just to try and tip it off the hip, and you forget the man's there. So that's a, that would be a tactic they would use. doing very, very hard for a left-handed to put clearly a cut shot for me, trying to play him off, trying to pick the length,

try and play him off the back foot and not get dragged into defending too many balls around there. But that's very easier said than done. And if he does slide a little bit, leg side, have a sweep. I wouldn't run at him, I don't think, on this pitch with the rough there, you know, if it does grip that, it's coming out everywhere. But what we did see, and we saw a little bit in actually the Sri Lanka games, couple of years ago where in England's mind on that first morning can you remember that game in

2018 where they just played really positively scored at like five and over but lost a few lost a few wickets and then Ben folks came in and actually just played nice and steady didn't he actually wasn't as bad a wicket as they'd thought it did turn but it wasn't like a minefield and in the back of my mind knowing that if I could get through the first 30 40 balls you just some I keep going on about subcontinent about him but you would find the rhythm of the pitch and you'd be able to work out where that was happening out of that rough a bit more and where when which balls were going to hit the rough you do you understand and you find you find a way and it is then possible to play you you will do you will need a little bit of luck early on because you will play a miss you'll

have that lunge forward and ashen spins one past you're outside edge you just hope you just don't nick it and um and you can get on with it but that's that's that's the only way i'll be saying we're saying get in, try, do anything you can to survive. If the ball's out the rough, let it hit your body from the left armour, kick away a few, just try and get that, try and get it into that ball's slightly older and then try and knock it around. That's the only way I'd play with that one area

when I'm thinking, right, if he's in that shot, I'm sweeping hard to try and get that boundary, try and put a little bit of pressure back on it. The sweep's interesting, because we saw the case today with Joe Root sweeping, it was a left arm spinner rather than you were talking about sweeping, what, the left arm spinning to you being left-handed. coming into you.

Are you trying to hit it hard with the sweep? I'm thinking in terms of, because you're sweeping out of your rough. So again, you're talking about the bounce. You don't quite much

is going to bounce. Are you looking just to kind of work it around the corner so that if it does get a topish edge, it's unlikely you to go to somebody or are you looking to actually hit it hard with a slight danger I'm guessing.

If it does get a top edge, actually it could carry to a fielder out there. I think, do you know what early on innings? I think you're looking to hit it hard for the reason of trying to put a bit of pressure back on the bowler. you know, trying to hit, if you're playing that shot, you are trying to hit it for four. You're trying to see where the man is on that, how, how square he is or how fine he is,

and try and beat him either way. So if he is, if he is behind square, I think I would cop my wrist a little bit and say, right, I'm going to try and hit this, you know, I cock it to try and cut the wrist, then that ball goes slightly straighter, so it goes in front of square. But I think it's a too, it's a risky shot. So you might as well be trying to get as maximum reward for it. I'll try and keep it down than I would go slog sweet, unless they obviously didn't have a cow corner but this day and age is the left arm

are very very rarely bowls without a cow corner because as the modern way is that the slog sweet is an acceptable shots are now playing test cricket and players play it a lot better so I'd imagine that guy will be there. What about the mindset? People say you get a ball that explodes my word we've seen a lot of those today is going boof and dust everywhere and the ball bounces and climbs how do you put that out of your mind? They all say all put that away and just face the next ball but I mean is it really

really possible to do that and do you do that or do you try and bear in mind actually that last ball around there blew up from there so if it's there again i might have to put a bit of extra leg in the way or body in the way or something or move your hands first if you are leaving and kicking it makes you know how many times do you see someone kick them trying to you know leave the ball and have the hands near the front pad because the usual way wouldn't bounce that much just on a little technical they make sure your hands are well away from it if it does hit the extra bat if it does bounce a bit more Aggard, you have to, you have to be, you have to accept it, it's going to be there, and you just have to go, well, you can't, you can't do anything other than put it to the back of your mind and just say, well, it is turning.

But what you can do, you can moan about it. Mowning about it, it isn't going to do any good, is it not going to do any good, is it? Like, you moan about it, well, it's ragging square. I can't play on it, possibly. Well, you might as well, you might as well, sit and sit down and have a cup of tea and say, well, it's not flat, I ain't going to score any runs in it. Do you enjoy it? Would you actually enjoy the challenge of batting on something that is just, you? you know massively stacked against you I do when you get in yeah I don't I didn't like the first 20 30 30 balls where he's just yeah you're like you're possibly on two of 30

balls and you're like this is so hard work for no you're you're you're grinding away for no reward whatsoever certainly the pressure of a situation this the Indian pressure now there's no pressure on their batsman there no Jara's coming shock he's batting I mean didn't feel because you've got a slightly sore hand but it seems perfectly fine to battle for all my money I had on the Pajara was going to bat at three there today. He ain't going to miss out on scoring a few rounds. He, you know, there's no pressure on there, is it?

Everyone said, well, why don't we just back like India in the second inning? He's run down and, but Gil ran down to get off the mark, chipped it over point leading edge. The next one, he chipped over on a pair. But if an England guy did that, you know, setting, you know, in that first over like, Dom Sibley ran down in the second over of just this innings and got caught mid on, everyone would be criticising the shot. So this situation is not actually a fairer.

reflection on how to play spin because it's a free shot for India. It's pressures off and it's amazing when the pressure is off in test cricket you can you get away of a lot more. Yeah. Just another thought. With DRS, I mean, whereas, you know, back in the day, you could actually cunningly, obviously hide your bat and you could kick a few away, you could get yourself in and so on. I mean, you can't do that now, can you? There is an element of risk in that shot. I'm not saying it's, you know, I'm saying here, saying, oh, you definitely sweep. It's, you know, it's the way to score runs. It's a very, it is a risky shot to play

but in my opinion it's the only shot you can really play I was surprised I was just thinking again I would probably out of nowhere just run at the left armour just to kick him away maybe just to know just so he thinks

you think you might do something or you might if they didn't have a middwicket have a try and run down and have a bit of a bit of a hack at it just so he doesn't all he has to do is run and land it there. As soon as the pressure goes back, as soon as the pressure goes back, you don't be reckless. You don't have to actually run. Just because you leave

the crees doesn't mean you have to play the big shot. You can run down and think, if it's in my area, I'm going to have a go. I might even just cloth it over midwicket for two, but at least he thinks I'm doing something. And actually the hard of the pitch is more proactive you have to be as a batsman, but you have to do it in your area.

There's no point running down and try and hit him through extra cover because that's, you know, nine impossible. Just looking through my, if I went through all my notes, Alistair, from your debut onwards, I don't think Cook caught brackets having a hack, close brackets, however many. I don't think it ever happened, did it? We about having a hack? No, I probably wasn't, but I bet I did come down. I bet I did come down and try and try on a hack and probably didn't get anything on it. It's just to show a little bit of only the ball coming in. I, you know, I wasn't as good when the ball's turning away, I found that

a lot harder to, a lot harder to score. Because you have to get some sort of initiative, don't You can't just allow a bowler to bowl after ball after ball. But you can't be reckless. It's going to be one with your name on it on these pitches. Yeah, there are. But your technique can survive. And that's why the work you do in the nets of surviving, you know, with your defence around it, there is a method in the madness.

You do rough up the nets. You know, you do get people to throw the other way. You know, in the nets where everyone bowls at one end and you're always bat at the other end. You get the bowling coach or the batting coach, sorry, to throw. you know, you swap the next round, so you're then batting, you know, where all the rough is and you put the stumps a bit further back so the rough where the bowlers is even more just so you're over-trained. So you can prepare for a little bit. You know, it's a bit different, but it's certainly something we did as a side. You've got people just to throw into the really,

really thing. It was a bit of a joke. Some hit you on your head. Some hit you everywhere. But at least you can kind of formulate a bit of an idea and a technique. podcast from BBC Radio 5 Live. So what's today been like in the England camp? Simon Mann has been speaking to the England assistant coach, Graham Thorpe. Graham, you played a hundred test matches. Were those the toughest second-day spin conditions that you've seen in your playing career and in your coaching career?

Yep, yep. It's incredibly challenging on that surface for us on day two. They're obviously very skilled spin attack as well on their own conditions and it was a very good toss to win. How should you try to bat on a pitch like that or is it a lottery? Well, there are some balls in the pitch

which you might not be able to do too much about. But we've talked about trying to have a plan being clear in the areas that you can attack and how you can rotate strike and how you can defend. So the guys had plans, but they didn't happen today for us. There were some good deliveries in there, some unfortunate dismissals as well, some good catches from India as well today. So we didn't get the partnerships going.

I thought Benfokes played very well. All got a little bit softer. It wasn't quite so much of the devil in the delivery. delivery, but we've lost early wickets in the piece, and that really set us back today. Is it a pitch that's fit or acceptable for the second day of a test match? Is it a pitch fit for test cricket? It's a very challenging surface. That's what I'm going to say. I think in terms of me commenting on the pitch, I think that's for someone above me to look

but it's obviously taken turn early in the game and as I said it was a very good toss to win to bat on day one. How do you see the game from here? I mean, 250 lead, three days left. It's going to be tough. Yeah, it is. We need, you'd say we need something very, very special to happen tomorrow for us and somebody to do something amazing with the bat.

So I think we knew we were going to have some tough days. and I think the most important thing is that our dressing room doesn't get too affected by today. We've got some players in our team which are touring this part of the world for the first time against a very, very strong Indian side. So just as last week when we won the first test match, here we know that we have to stand up, keep learning as well. I think that's the most important thing that some of our players keep learning and developing. in this part of the world. We knew we were going to have some challenging days here.

Don't forget, you can follow the third days play in Chanai on the BBC Sport website and the app with the cricket social available worldwide from 6.30 a.m. We're back again tomorrow at the close of play with another podcast, and we'll see you then. This is the TMS podcast from BBC Radio 5 Live. I'm Bella Mackey. And I'm Greg James.

We realised that we didn't pay much attention at school, and so we've decided to do something about him. Our new podcast is called Teach Me a Lesson. Our lesson title for today is Are People Born Evil? We've been searching for the most inspiring teachers in the UK. And each week we're going to learn something fascinating from them. What do RuPaul and Aristotle have in common? And my initial answer would be like attitude.

Well, my initial answer would be bald. So come and learn some new stuff with us. Teach me a lesson with Greg James and Bella Mackey. Listen now on BBC. BBC Sounds. BBC Sounds, music, radio, podcasts.