RAJKOT: India needed such a day. Just to send the message out to those who had started believing they could be taken down at home. A team in transition, India have lost three Tests in a little over three years, two more than they did in the preceding eight years, but in Rajkot they delivered an emphatic shellacking to their latest challengers: the 434-run win was India’s biggest by runs, and England’s second-biggest defeat.
On a spring day, with not a cloud in sight, in front of a big crowd, the Indian batting took apart the visiting bowlers to set an impossible target, before the home bowlers turned the same pitch into a minefield. Along the way, the batters broke a handful of records while threatening to break even more. It was a first showing of such dominance for this new set of batters.
Yashasvi Jaiswal, who had retired-hurt on 105, came back to end up with a second-consecutive double-hundred, in the course of which he equalled the record for the most sixes in a Test innings and carried India to the record for most sixes in a Test. India also beat their own record for most sixes in a series – with two Tests to spare in this gig, of course.
Three decades after a young left-hand batter from Mumbai announced himself on the Test stage with consecutive double-centuries, Jaiswal emulated Vinod Kambli’s feat and also became the third-youngest to two Test double-centuries. His innings included 12 sixes and 14 fours, but he had to wait to come back as the first 90 minutes belonged to the nightwatcher.
Kuldeep Yadav absolutely bossed the early exchanges, hitting his first six in international cricket, defending properly, making England burn a review, running Shubman Gill out nine short of hundred, and eventually hurting Joe Root’s finger when he offered him the catch that got him.
In the company of his Mumbai senior but India junior, Test debutant Sarfaraz Khan, Jaiswal resumed watchfully before they both got into an exhibition and a competition of power-hitting and gap-finding. Jaiswal was the clear winner as Sarfaraz managed only 68 in a 172-run stand in just 26.2 overs.
