Sir Alastair Cook urges England to press home advantage against 'shaken' India
Sir Alastair Cook has urged England to press home their advantage over a depleted India in the second Test.
Ben Stokes' side go into the match in Visakhapatnam on Friday full of confidence after producing one of England’s greatest ever Test wins in Hyderabad. Ollie Pope’s stunning 196 set up a fourth-innings chase of 231 for India and debutant spinner Tom Hartley took seven wickets to wrap up victory by 28 runs.
Before that shock, India had lost just three home Tests in 11 years, going unbeaten in 14 Test series since Cook captained England to a 2-1 win in 2012. Cook is working as a pundit for TNT Sports and thinks the tourists have broken the aura around Rohit Sharma’s side.
“It will give England a lot of confidence and when you play on the sub-continent it can be very overpowering,” he said. “We know how much Indians love cricket and if you get behind the momentum seems to be very hard to stop.
“The tours I went on, when we got behind it’s very hard to change it. And I think this will just see those England players looking at each other saying ‘Actually we can compete against these’. India have some of the greats of the game in their team, but because of that status and the financial pull of the IPL you can see them as demi-gods and they’re obviously treated like demi-gods. Subconsciously that can sometimes play with your mind.
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“Actually, the guys who haven’t played much out there saw them as very good cricketers but normal cricketers who can be beaten. Yes, it took an incredible innings from someone to do it, but this England side and the talent they have in that batting line-up, it could be one of four or five who could play an innings like that.”
India are without their talismanic batter Virat Kohli and have also lost outstanding all-rounder Ravindra Jadeja and KL Rahul for the second Test. And Cook felt India were “all at sea” in Hyderabad after being shaken by the comeback led by Pope’s expert playing of spin.
India captain Rohit Sharma had no answers to Ollie Pope's onslaught (NOAH SEELAM/AFP via Getty Images)HAVE YOUR SAY! Will England maintain their momentum and win the second Test against India? Comment below.
“They did look a little bit all at sea. I think it shook them,” he said. “When you're 190 runs ahead [on first innings] and they're so used to winning games – they've only lost three Test matches out of 40-odd at home – suddenly [India thought], 'oh god, oh this won't happen for much longer'.
“The reverse sweep, when Ollie Pope kept playing it, Rohit didn't change the field for a while because he thought, well, stats say that if you play a high-risk shot against world-class bowling like Jadeja, [Ravichandran] Ashwin and [Axar] Patel, that the odds are stacked in your favour. But actually the skill of the English batsman to continue executing the shots really well, then they had to blink. By the time they blinked, they missed the [boat]. So tactically, it's going to be intriguing to see what India do.”
While Sharma’s captaincy looked shaky against Pope’s onslaught, Cook was hugely impressed by how Stokes managed Hartley. The left-arm spinner saw his first ball in Test cricket hit for six and Cook admitted he might have taken him out of the firing line, but Stokes was unfazed and was greatly rewarded by his match-winning spell on day four.
Ben Stokes captained Tom Hartley expertly in the first Test (Stu Forster/Getty Images)“As an all-rounder being captain, one of the strengths is you know what it's like to be hit for six. Obviously my bowling quality meant I never got hit for six, so I wouldn't know what it felt like,” he joked. "All-rounders have a lot on your plate anyway – he isn't technically an all rounder at the minute but you know the fact that he knows what it's like when you're bowling. When you go around the park you have bad moments. Same as a batter.
“I think we've all been slightly surprised, not how well he's done, but the kind of emotional intelligence he's had. The feel for the game and his ability to unite the side as well as he has. It's been fantastic. I'm a massive fan of watching.”
England are without the injured Jack Leach for the second Test, meaning Shoaib Bashir will make his debut, while James Anderson will replace Mark Wood as the only seamer in the attack.
Tune in to the second Test of England’s tour of India, live on TNT Sports 1 from 3.30am on 2ndFebruary. Sign up to TNT Sports and discovery+
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