Despite suffering a forgettable loss against England at Edgbaston in the rescheduled final Test of the 5-match series, India still had some positives to take away from the game which was otherwise easily dominated by England’s dominating chase. One of them is was the batting form of Rishabh Pant, who scored a rapid, counter-attacking knock of 146(111) in the first innings, before complementing that with a half-century in the third innings.
In doing so, he became the India wicketkeeper with the most runs scored in a single Test match outside of Asia. England’s Test captain Ben Stokes showered praises on Pant, pointing out how significant his innings were, and how important his wicket in the third innings was. Without that wicket, Rishabh Pant could have taken the game away from England without even them realizing it.
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During the post-match press conference, Ben Stokes said, “He is someone who would fit very well in our team at the moment, the way he goes about the game.”
England’s new identity under his captaincy and the coaching of Brendon McCullum is to attack and always play dominating cricket, something which was shown in Jonny Bairstow’s back-to-back centuries in the match, as well as Joe Root’s century in the chase.
Elaborating the same, Ben Stokes said, “Rishabh Pant’s innings for India in the first innings was obviously against us, but I absolutely loved watching it. Being on the receiving end of that, it was incredible to watch, and he’s someone who has had criticism in the past but now is getting the plaudits for playing that way.”
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Pant brought up his first-innings century in 89 balls. His innings were significant in India’s recovery from 98-5 to 416. His innings got him a lot of credit from all across the cricketing world for his braveness and aggression, but also for his ability to pick his balls and commit to attacking certain bowlers.
Pant will be back in action in the white-ball series against Jos Buttler’s England, with him being in the squad for the second and third T20Is as well as the ODI series.
