Reflections on England's Third Defeat in the Sub-Continent in Five Games

In the film Clockwise John Cleese's character laments: "I can cope with the despair, it's the hope I can't stand!" Whenever an England defeat reminds me of that quote I have to reflect that their performance wasn't as bad as the commentators and press are making out, because at some point I believed that they would win.

There were moments of hope in England's nine wicket defeat in the second test against India. At 288-6 England appeared to be destined for a challenging total, but they collapsed to 300 all out. India had weakened their batting line-up for this game and so when England reduced them to 153-5, a first innings lead look probable. However, after humiliating the England bowlers with the ball, the Indian bowlers then punished them with the bat and secured a 38 run lead. After that little went right for England's young team. Their batsmen should have been able to make the game safe and their failure to do so reminds England fans how close the team came to disaster at the Oval last summer.

Sehwag and Dravid then made light of the awkward task of chasing 144 in little over two sessions on the fifth day of a test match. It truly looked like men against boys as England's bowlers tried too hard and saw the patient Indian batsmen punish the resulting errors in line and length.

Now that India have secured a vital lead, we can expect a batsman's wicket at Mumbai. The only challenge facing the English side now is to strive to lose the series 1-0 not 2-0.