India tried to make hay, and succeeded in making history. They have never lost a T20 like this, not even nearly. England prevailed by the ludicrous margin of 125 runs, 45 more than their opponents’ previous record defeat, after shredding the most feared batting side in world cricket for just 76 runs and in fewer than a dozen overs.
- India's batters repeatedly lofted to fielders, forcing wickets; only three overs lacked a dismissal.
- Jofra Archer produced a superb, searing spell, uprooting the middle order with pace and a lethal bouncer.
- Early top-order wickets from Abhishek Sharma, Vaibhav Sooryavanshi, Ishan Kishan, and Shreyas Iyer derailed the chase.
- Contrasting England innings: Phil Salt struggled then recovered; Jos Buttler set tempo before being yorked by Prince Yadav.
- Sam Curran remained unbeaten, steering England to a target India could not match after the collapse.
Vaibhav Sooryavanshi sent the sixth ball of India’s innings flying over deep third. The first ball of the second over, a full toss, was carted over point by Abhishek Sharma, the third launched by Sooryavanshi off his pads and over deep square leg. Nine balls bowled, 22 runs scored, ball deposited into the crowd three times. At this point India were all about sixes. Soon they were at sixes and sevens.
All the talk pre-match had been of how ideal this surface would be for batting, on a traditionally high-scoring ground and with a dry, lightning-fast outfield. But England had struggled for much of their innings and India’s target was an unexpectedly low 202. In trying to blast their way to victory, they blundered their way to defeat.
As their evening unravelled their batters simply refused to keep the ball on the ground, at least until their chances of victory were themselves subterranean. Instead they hit high, and very often straight to fielders. A run chase that might have been a stroll was punctuated with head-spinning regularity by batters walking, dolefully, back towards the dressing room. Only three of England’s overs did not feature at least one dismissal.
Abhishek was the first to go, hitting Josh Tongue to Phil Salt at deep point in the second over. In the third Sooryavanshi swished at Jofra Archer’s bouncer and gloved the ball behind. That India’s boy wonder has after just two appearances already top-scored for his side is not surprising; that he did so with just 13 is.
Ishan Kishan equalled him, before pulling the last ball of the fourth to Jacob Bethell at deep backward square leg, and Shreyas Iyer flicked the first ball of the fifth, possibly the worst of a superb spell by Archer in which he maxed out at 93.3mph, to the same fielder in the same position. When Axar Patel was caught behind off the last ball of that over, India had played five overs, lost five wickets, and were careering towards disaster.
Shreyas, India’s new captain, continued his two extraordinary 100% records: after four completed games and one that only made it to halfway he has won every toss and lost every match. But while they had bats in their hands England did not look en route to such a remarkable result, or any kind of positive one.
Salt, out first ball at Old Trafford on Saturday, had a contrasting innings on this occasion, lasting into the 17th over, even if at times it was scarcely more convincing. The evening started with a maiden, Arshdeep Singh finding vicious inswing with the new ball, and it took a while for the England opener to show any semblance of form.
Of England’s opening partnership of 43 – their best for 16 games dating back to the trip to Ireland last September – he contributed just six, off 10 balls; by the end of the fifth over Jos Buttler had faced twice as many deliveries and scored six times as many runs. But then the ball was tossed to Prince Yadav, the 24-year-old playing just his fourth international, and his first delivery was a delicious fast yorker to which Buttler had no answer, the ball coming off his toe and deflecting into the stumps.
For a while Salt kept going, with few clean hits and few runs, playing so haplessly that when he under-edged past the wicketkeeper in the eighth over he raised both arms in celebration at a rare boundary. That helped Salt to end the ninth over on 17 off 19. One over later he had doubled his score, after hitting Varun Chakravarthy for a couple of fours – one courtesy of a misfield – and a purely struck six over midwicket. And with that, finally, he was away.
In the end his was an innings of two parts: those first 19 balls that brought 17 runs and a lot of awkwardness, and another 25 off which he scored 53 before, with the end of the innings and potentially a century in sight, he top-edged Axar to short third. Sam Curran ended the innings unbeaten on 41 off 24 to help England to 201. It should have been hard to defend, but India were indefensible.
