India fightback in style on day 3 , need 192 to win , Ashwin , Kuldeep rattle England

 

India is pressing England hard in the Ranchi Test as they gought back in style after a mediocre day 2.   5 wickets for Ravichandran Ashwin with ball in hand and 4 for Kuldeep after a glorious innings from Dhruv Jurel .  India need 152 more runs to win the fourth Test on day 5.  At the end of the third day, India scored 40 runs without losing any wicket.  Rohit Sharma unbeaten on 24 runs which included some sparkling boundaries while Yashaswi Jaiswal scored 16 runs and looked confident as usual . 

 England scored 353 runs in the first innings.  Joe Root scored 122 runs in that innings.  He gave oxygen to the struggling team after England lost 5 wickets for 112 runs. Keeper Ben Foakes scored 47 runs.  Ollie Robinson added a crucial 58 runs in the lower order.  Which helped England to score 353 runs.

 The ball was going low on the dry pitch from day one.  It was thought that it would be difficult to score runs on such a pitch.  But Joe Root showed that if batters play proper shots and show right temperament, the runs will come.  Many of the Indian batsmen could not do that in the first innings .  However in the beginning  Jaiswal gave the team confidence by scoring 73 runs.  Dhruv Jurel and Kuldeep Yadav gave the team confidence on Sunday morning .  India was moving forward relying on their bat.  Jurel's valiant 90 brought India's runs close to England's. He played some sparkling shots in an innings of great composure abd maturity  but Jurel got out 10 runs away from hundred bowled by a beauty from Bashir . Earlier Kuldeep fell after scoring a stubborn 29 runs .  England led by 46 runs in the first innings after India's fightback reduced the  deficit to a great extent . 

India did not allow England to settle in the second innings.  The English batsmen were having trouble dealing with the Indian spinners.  Ravichandran Ashwin put England under pressure by dismissing Ben Duckett (15) caught by Sarfraz  and Ollie Pope (0) lbw in two consecutive balls.  Stokes could not handle the pressure of losing 2 wickets for 19 runs.  Apart from opener Jack Crawley, no one managed to score  to speak of.  Joe Root (11), Stokes (4) could not give the team confidence. Root was lbw to Ashwin and Stokes bowled by a ball that kept very low .  Jonny Bairstow looked dangerous for a while before Jadeja had him caught by Patidar for 30 

 Crawley's innings of 60 runs came from his bat.  He was steadfast in his goal even though wickets were falling at the other end of the wicket.  Crawley finished his innings with seven sparkling fours abd finally was bowled by Kuldeep's sharp turn .  Ben Foakes  scored 17 runs but Kuldeep abd Ashwin quickly folded up the England's innings which ended on 145 runs.  Ravichandran Ashwin took 5 wickets.  Kuldeep Yadav took 4 wickets.  Ravindra Jadeja took the other wicket.

India now needs another 152 runs to win with 2 days left . Their batters need to bat with positive intent but play normal cricket shots without trying anything across the line .  England will require wickets at regular intervals . The 4th day promises to be an exciting one .