England

It meant, after bowling two overs to start the day’s play, England were short a bowling option. Nevertheless, they rallied to dismiss India for 255, with the inexperienced spin trio of Tom Hartley, Rehan Ahmed and Shoaib Bashir combining for eight wickets to limit England’s target to 399 to win in Visakhapatnam for an unlikely

England 67 for 1 (Crawley 29*, Duckett 28) and 253 need another 332 runs to beat India 396 and 225 (Gill 104, Axar 45, Hartley 4-77, Rehan 3-88, Anderson 2-29) Ludicrous though it may sound, the chase is on. No team has ever hunted down a target of 399 to win a Test match in

England batter Hamza Shaikh ensured his time at the Under-19 World Cup would not be forgotten when he was given out obstructed the field against Zimbabwe. In the 17th over, Shaikh defended a ball down by his feet and Zimbabwe wicketkeeper Ryan Kamwemba started to come from behind the stumps to collect it. Then, with

India 396 (Jaiswal 209) and 28 for 0 (Jaiswal 15*, Rohit 13*) lead England 253 (Crawley 76, Bumrah 6-45) by 171 runs Ben Stokes’ expression said it all. For the second time in as many first-innings counterattacks, all he could do was shrug his shoulders and marvel at the genius of the man who’d just

Australia batter Cameron Bancroft will return to Gloucestershire this year after signing a deal to represent the club across formats in the 2024 season. Bancroft was recently overlooked by Australia’s selectors for the Test opening spot vacated by David Warner, but has been prolific for Western Australia in the last two Sheffield Shield seasons. He

The ECB has made an unsuccessful request to New Zealand Cricket (NZC) to move the dates of England’s upcoming women’s tour, with four players deemed unavailable for the first three T20Is as a result of their Women’s Premier League (WPL) commitments in India and two others pulling out of their franchise contracts. NZC confirmed the

India 336 for 6 (Jaiswal 179*, Bashir 2-100, Ahmed 2-61) vs England You can only judge a pitch after both sides have Bazballed on it, or so the saying might now go, after England’s preposterous exploits in Hyderabad. On Yashasvi Jaiswal‘s watch, India appeared in the mood to make amends for their first-Test failings, thanks

Mark Alleyne, the former England allrounder who captained Gloucestershire to an unprecedented era of success in the 1990s and 2000s, has been named as the club’s new head coach. Alleyne won nine trophies during his time as Gloucestershire’s captain and also oversaw the club’s promotion to the top flight of the County Championship. He will

Big picture It’s happened before. India have gone 1-0 down at home, and India have bounced back. This is what India will be telling themselves: ‘We’ve been here before. We trust ourselves to find our way out of this. We trust our methods.’ It’s what they should tell themselves too. Change is a fact of

Shoaib Bashir, the 20-year-old Somerset offspinner, will make his Test debut at Visakhapatnam on Friday, after being named as Jack Leach’s replacement in England’s XI. Bashir linked up with the squad midway through their 28-run victory in Hyderabad last week, after suffering complications with his India visa, but will slot straight into the team as

Ben Stokes has confirmed that Jack Leach will not be available for the second Test in Visakhapatnam after failing to recover from a knee injury sustained during the first Test. Leach hurt his knee fielding on the first day of the Test in Hyderabad, before exacerbating the issue on the second morning. Though restricted to

Brendon McCullum has said that Shoaib Bashir is in contention to make his England debut in the second Test at Visakhapatnam on Friday, and has floated the possibility of fielding an all-spin attack at some stage in his side’s five-match series in India. Bashir linked up with the squad in Hyderabad on Sunday after a

It feels a bit of a missed opportunity to have the second of a five-Test series take place in the ‘City of Destiny’. Perhaps recent history was considered when sorting the order of the off-broadway venues selected for this India-England series. Only the games up front are guaranteed to be live. But as both teams

The incident occurred in the 81st over of England’s second innings. Ollie Pope, who scored 196, pushed a delivery through the off side and went for a run, but Bumrah was reported to have intentionally stood in the way, a move which led to physical contact. Pope was not pleased, and was seen taking it

Richard Gleeson, the fast bowler who made his England debut at 34, has signed with Warwickshire for the 2024 T20 Blast after he was released by Lancashire at the end of last season. With Henry Brookes leaving for Middlesex on a three-year deal, Warwickshire will use Gleeson as a like-for-like replacement in their T20 side.

Few players can have experienced as many of Test cricket’s highs and lows as Tom Hartley did on debut across the four days of the first Test at Hyderabad. Hartley’s first delivery in Test cricket was carted by opener Yashasvi Jaiswal over long-on for six. His 308th and most recent spun past an on-rushing Mohammed

Rohit Sharma feels India were not “brave enough” in their second innings and they “overall failed as a team” as they went down by 28 runs in Hyderabad. “When you are put against a wall, you need to show character and you need to be brave enough, which I thought we weren’t,” Rohit said on

Ben Stokes described England’s unlikely turnaround win against India in Hyderabad as their “greatest triumph” since he took over as captain, and labelled Ollie Pope‘s second-innings 196 “the greatest innings that has ever been played in the subcontinent by an English batsman”. England have won 14 of their 19 Tests since Stokes took over as

Where did India lose the game in Hyderabad? Was it when their spinners were unable to stop Ollie Pope and England running rampant in the second innings? Was it when their batting was unable to deal with the rookie left-arm spinner Tom Hartley on the fourth day? Nope. Head coach Rahul Dravid says the biggest

The reverse sweep was England’s second most profitable shot (48 off 30 balls, no dismissals) in the second innings that took them from 190 behind to 126 ahead. Ollie Pope and Ben Duckett in particular were using it repeatedly, throwing India’s spinners off the good length area where most of the danger lurked in this

England’s women are facing a choice between club and country, with a clash looming between the final stages of the Women’s Premier League (WPL) in India and a bilateral T20I series in New Zealand. The BCCI confirmed this week that the WPL final will take place on the evening of March 17 in Delhi, with

India 421 for 7 (Rahul 86, Jadeja 81*, Jaiswal 80, Bharat 41, Axar 35*, Root 2-77, Hartley 2-131) lead England 246 by 175 runs India all but batted England out of the first Test as early as the second day, overhauling their 246 for a first-innings lead of 175 and three wickets still in hand.

A left knee injury to Jack Leach compounded a miserable second day for England in Hyderabad that saw India march to a first-innings lead of 175 in the first Test. Leach, who has been Ben Stokes’ main spinner throughout his tenure and came into this match as the leader of a three-pronged spin attack, sustained

England were not expecting Yashasvi Jaiswal and Rohit Sharma, India’s openers, to play with the attacking intent that they did on the first evening of the first Test in Hyderabad. That is according to Ben Duckett, who insisted that England’s total of 246 was “an above-par score” after nine wickets fell to spin across the

India 119 for 1 (Jaiswal 76*, Gill 14*) trail England 246 (Stokes 70, Bairstow 37, Ashwin 3-68) by 127 runs The newest gimmick in Test cricket arrived in spurts – not always from the team credited with it – but the oldest truth of the oldest format was reinforced on day one of the series:

English counties are pushing for an increase in the payments they receive from the ECB when players they have developed appear in international or representative cricket. Early discussions have started between the 18 first-class counties and the ECB over an updated County Partnership Agreement (CPA) which will replace the existing arrangements and cover the 2025-28

Big picture Bazball vs spin. It promises to be the story of these five Tests, and it might be a story of parallel plots. There is, of course, Bazball vs India’s spinners. But perhaps even more relevant to England’s chances is the question of Bazball vs England’s spinners. What? Hang in there. All will be

The British government has called on India to “treat British citizens fairly at all times in its visa process” amid the ongoing difficulties of Shoaib Bashir, the Somerset offspinner, to secure entry to India for his first England Test tour. The intervention came as Ben Stokes, England’s captain, revealed his squad briefly considered refusing to

Ben Stokes says he is “frustrated” by the ongoing delay with Shoaib Bashir‘s visa application for England’s tour of India, which has forced the Somerset offspinner to return to the UK, subsequently ruling him out of the first Test. England arrived in India on Sunday without Bashir, who remained in Abu Dhabi where the squad

The physique is as lean as it ever has been. The tattoos now stretch across a sleeker canvas. The cheekbones protrude a little more. Only the beard looks burdened with extra heft. Blow the dust off the memes – Ben Stokes looks more like Vincent van Gogh than ever before. A cricketer’s appearance rarely, if