England's five-wicket loss to India in Ranchi saw Ben Stokes' side suffer a first series defeat of the Bazball era but, with four Test wins from their last 11, is a pattern starting to emerge? follow the fifth Test from March 7-11 on skysports.com and the Sky Sports App
Tuesday 27 February 2024 19:35, UK
England's third-straight Test defeat in India can be viewed through two very different lenses. Both equally justifiable.
India have now won 17 straight series at home, an utterly formidable prospect in their own conditions, and England have been competitive throughout all four Tests. Though their five-wicket defeat in Ranchi saw them lose the series, it's only the first of the Brendon McCullum and Ben Stokes reign - at the seventh time of asking.
Yet, after a period of unprecedented success to start Stokes' captaincy, with 10 wins from England's first 11 Tests, only four have followed from the last 11 - their most recent series triumph coming over a year ago in Pakistan.
"I feel they've given a pretty good account of themselves," Michael Atherton said on the latest Sky Sports Cricket Podcast. "It has been competitive and India know they've been in a scrap.
"In the end they've just not quite been good enough. There's kind of a lingering regret over the opportunities they've missed."
'Missed opportunities' has proven a familiar narrative from England's most recent Test defeats and, here, we've picked out some of their most notable near misses of the Bazball era.
One run. One measly run is all England were denied by as they tied their two-match series in New Zealand in February of last year, beaten by the barest of margins in one of the greatest Test matches of all time.
England could literally do no wrong heading to Wellington for the second Test, fresh from securing a historic 3-0 series sweep in Pakistan and having hammered the hosts by 267 runs in the first Test in Mount Maunganui.
As Joe Root (153no) and Harry Brook (186) combined to put on a staggering 302-run partnership in the first innings, England then bowling New Zealand out for 209 to enforce the follow on, it looked for all the world that another series whitewash was within their grasp.
The Kiwis had other ideas, however. Kane Williamson dug in to score a magnificent 132 as the hosts blunted the England attack for a massive 162.3 overs in the second innings - Jack Leach tasked with 61.3 of those - and set Stokes' side a stiff target of 258 to chase.
The tourists were left in disarray when reduced to 80-5 early on the fifth morning, before Root (95) and Stokes (33) combined for a sixth-wicket stand of 121 that was seemingly steering the ship to victory.
Enter Neil Wagner (4-62). New Zealand's left-arm-fast enforcer bounced out both Stokes and Root in consecutive overs and then claimed the crucial final wicket of James Anderson with England one short - the Black Caps becoming just the fourth team in Test history to win a match after following on.
That declaration. You know the one, Root left on 118 not out as England opted to declare on 393-8 and have four overs at Australia late on day one of the 2023 Ashes. That was the talking point as Stokes' side were narrowly defeated by two wickets in the first Test at Edgbaston.
Sky Sports' Nasser Hussain certainly wasn't surprised by the move, telling of a prophetic conversation he'd had with England's captain previously. "I said to Stokes a month ago, 'If you were eight down in the first innings, would you declare?'" Hussain said at the end of day one. "He said, 'Yeah, why would we send Anderson out to bat?'"
On a great pitch for batting, Usman Khawaja then cracked a magnificent 141 to get Australia up near England's total, the visitors ultimately succumbing seven runs short before England were reduced to 28-2 in overcast conditions late on day three.
Root wrestled back the momentum in some style, nailing that much-debated reverse-scoop of his for six in just the second over of the fourth day as England set Australia 281 in the fourth innings - evoking memories of the 282 the tourists famously fell two short of on the same ground during the 2005 series.
The finish on day five proved to be just as dramatic, nail-biting and nerve-jangling as that thrilling conclusion from 18 years prior, with Australia captain Pat Cummins (44no) and Nathan Lyon (16no) rescuing their side from 227-8 with an unbroken, match-winning 55-run partnership.
Asked after the game if he had any regrets, Stokes said he had not one and that the move "sent a message to Australia about how we want to take them on".
England certainly didn't relent from their aggressive approach in the second Test of the series at Lord's but, as they fell behind 2-0 in the series with a 43-run defeat, the critics started to circle.
Coming under most scrutiny was the way in which England wasted a golden opportunity when well-placed at 188-1 in response to Australia's first-innings 416. Three wickets fell for 34 late on day two - Ben Duckett out two short of a maiden Ashes ton - and then a further six for 47 as the hosts coughed up a 91-run advantage to their opponents, their batters repeatedly falling to the short ball.
Atherton told Sky Sports at the time: "If you go back to last summer, England's approach is one of calculated aggression. Here, it seems to be all-out aggression, no matter what. They were just the wrong side of reckless in that innings."
Kevin Pietersen, who'd called England "a shambles" earlier in the Test, added: "I know it's all about Bazball, and 'we're going to play this way, we will always chase a win'. But can they, against this Australian side, tinker with what they're doing, because what they have done this week and last week [at Edgbaston] certainly didn't work?"
England almost fought their way back into the Test, with Stokes very nearly pulling off the unthinkable to better even his Headingley heroics from 2019 with a frankly ridiculous final-day 155 that contained nine sixes and as many boundaries.
There would also be a controversial stumping of Jonny Bairstow on that fifth day that would rile Stuart Broad, spark a verbal scrap in the Lord's Pavilion between members and the Australian team, and even see politicians wade into the debate. But, really, the damage was done by England's 'reckless' batting in the first innings.
Bazball looked to be back after two wins in three Tests to close out the Ashes - only rain denying England at Old Trafford - and a stunning success at Hyderabad to open the series in India. But some familiar failings have been exposed in the three-straight defeats to follow, most notably the dominant positions thrown away in each of the last two matches in Rajkot and Ranchi.
Rajkot stirred memories of that Lord's defeat last summer as England subsided from 224-2 to 319 all out in reply to India's first-innings 445 - Root receiving widespread criticism for sparking the collapse when falling to that very same reverse-scoop shot that served him so well in the Ashes, the tourists ultimately succumbing to a massive 434-run defeat.
"Root's dismissal sort of sums up where we are with Bazball. It will thrill and frustrate in equal measure," Hussain told Sky Sports. "When he played it at Edgbaston, I didn't mind it at all… it sent a real message to everyone in the changing room that England's best player is going to take on Australia. Root will be sitting in his room tonight going, 'I think I got that one wrong'."
Ranchi was even more a case of 'what could have been'. Root responded to his doubters in the best possible way with a sublime 122 not out in the first innings and England entered the third morning eyeing a sizeable lead after reducing India to 219-7 in reply to their score of 353.
But Dhruv Jurel resisted, and not for the last time, as his 90 runs ate at England's advantage, reducing it to 46 before the visitors suffered an almighty second-innings collapse of seven for 35 in the face of spin bowling of the highest order on a helpful surface - Ravichandran Ashwin taking 5-51 and Kuldeep Yadav 4-22.
England's much greener spin twins of Shoaib Bashir (3-79) and Tom Hartley (1-70) did their best to drag the team back into things as India lost five for 36 to stumble to 120-5 in pursuit of 192 to win, but Shubman Gill (52no) and Jurel (39no) dug in to see them over the line.
Despite another defeat, McCullum remains bullish about his team's prospects. The England head coach said: "We've lost this series and we didn't win the Ashes, but we're a better cricket team than we were 18 months ago and we've got opportunity in the next 18 months to do some pretty special s***."
Follow over-by-over text commentary from the fifth and final Test between India and England, in Dharamshala, live on skysports.com and the Sky Sports App from 3.30am on Thursday, March 7 (first ball at 4am).
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