London: Ben Stokes appeared visibly jaded during the media conference on Wednesday. It was an hour after a biceps injury excluded it from the fifth and last test from the oval on Thursday. Although he was necessarily disappointed, he plowed the long interaction of 15 minutes.Fatigue also showed the face of the captain of India Shubman Gill. However, he chose not to talk about it. Rather, he opted for words as “exciting” and “opportunity”, in addition to highlighting the great loss for England that Stokes lacks the test.While England has announced that they would be without their first -line rhythm attack in Stokes, Jofra Archer and Brydon Carse, Gill chose to keep his cards near his chest until the morning of the test. Consequently, there was no official confirmation on the availability of Jasprit Bumrah. However, it will be a big effort from the management of the team and Bumrah if he takes the ground to play his fourth test on the tour on Thursday.It was a very long and exhausting series. The inhabitants here compare it to the Ashes of 2005. Even this series did not have each of its first four tests at the last session. This series was an anomaly, especially at a time when the guards of the game even discuss four -day tests to maintain the living format.The two teams were beaten, tired and daring when they arrived here with a 2-1 score promoting England. Emotions overturned on the ground during the last two tests. There was a frequent needle in Lord’s and Old Trafford. Each team has tended to invoke the spirit of cricket after each incident, whether it was the captain of India, Shubman Gill, tearing Zakcrawley and Ben Duckett to Lord’s or Stokes while deriving Ravira Jadeja and Washington Sundar for dragging the game to finish their centuries.
Flat bowling stokes despite the transport of Niggles in the last two tests and Rishabh Pant beating with a broken foot showed how the two teams have pushed their limits. This week will be to empty their tanks.There was this undeniable nervousness and tension at the oval on match Eve. The altercation of the head coach of India Gautam Gambir with the curator on Tuesday added another subject of discussion. Stokes remained away from the controversy with an “I was not” response. Gill, who was also not there on Tuesday, ridiculed the curator, suggesting that his coach staff remain 2.5 meters from the field.These incidents injected a life into a series that started with experts calling the two too friendly teams. It is also true that the two teams have not tried to explode. “I think that once you have finished the match, you’ve finished with the match. And you go to the next one. And you want to play the next as competitive and as best as you can,” Gill said on Wednesday.
“Nothing of this kind,” was Gill’s quick response to a request if he thought that hospitality was not up to the series. “I think these are three very separate movements, not at all correlated,” he added.Contemporary test cricket does not see many first leg games. This team from India, in particular, is mainly used to playing short tests that find it difficult to go deep. Stokes did not bother them to concede that it sucks the players a lot, both physically and mentally.“It is tiring, but obviously, the mental side of it is also tiring. It was a difficult and exhausting series, but it is a class game. It is a real test of character and physics,” said Stokes, adding that the two teams have become examples for other countries.“The way the two teams have taken care of each session and gave everything for their country testifies to what this format means for England and India and all the other world teams. The easy option would be to abandon. I do not see that it is different this week.
Gill himself had conceded in Manchester that he was mentally more exhausting than physically. On Wednesday, he chose to talk about the importance of the test match. “I am sitting in front of you excited for the last test,” he said with a smile. “It is very important. The series score does not determine the type of cricket we have played. Apart from India with a relatively young team, I think it will be a great success for us. If we are able to level the series. And the series was a great learning curve for me, “he said.
More alive pitch?
Stokes reiterated that he hoped for more conducive to quaisors than they have in the series. It could be a reason behind the two teams, the pacers break. Reading Stokes, the oval terrain in the greenish air is probably more alive. England will need it with their missing front lines.
The calendar
Stokes highlighted the need to have standard breaks between matches in a five test series. “If you had two eight-day gaps and nine days, then two three-day turnarounds, you might be able to consider making four or five days for each match so that there is this consistency,” he said.Gill, too, believes that a three -day turnaround is too short for players, but also understood the challenges of planning such a series. “Three days, it’s too little turnaround when the two teams play as hard cricket. We understand that if you continue to give a break of five or six days, the tour becomes very long. The decision was taken by the boards of directors and we have confidence in the decision,” said Gill.