After the end of the opening day game of the fifth and final Test between the hosts England and the visitors India at The Oval (London), Indian cricketer Cheteshwar Pujara took up the ‘1-minute match report challenge’.
In overall, it was a great day for the visiting side. English skipper Joe Root decided to bat first after winning the toss on Friday morning. English openers Alastair Cook and Keaton Jennings provided a good start as they put a 60-run partnership, the joint highest opening partnership in this Test series (other twice for India).
After Jennings was dismissed (23) just before the lunch, Moeen Ali supported Cook to play the long innings in his final Test match. Playing his final international cricket match, Cook completed a brilliant half-century in 139 balls and scored 71 runs off 190 balls with eight fours.
Cook and Ali had another 73-run partnership for the second wicket, but once that partnership was broken, English team suffered a huge batting collapse in the final session.
While England scored 68/1 at lunch and 123/1 at tea, they finished the day on 198/7 where Jos Buttler (11*) was batting with Adil Rashid (4*). Apart from Cook, Ali (50) also completed his half-century before losing his wicket.
Among the Indian bowlers, the experienced pacer Ishant Sharma (3/28) picked up three wickets while another pacer Jasprit Bumrah (2/41) and the left-arm spinner Ravindra Jadeja (2/57) bagged two wickets each.
After completion of the day’s game, Indian cricketer Cheteshwar Pujara took up the ‘1-minute match report challenge’, where he briefly described the day in less than 60 minutes.
Pujara stated, “It has been an excellent day for us. We started off really well in the first session, although Alastair Cook batted really well in that session but we kept on bowling in the right areas and it was a good session for us, within the give anything away, within bowl to many lose balls.
“Second session was again we kept on doing the same thing, within give anything away and within gave any runs away and we bowled really well. Within get too many wickets but the last session was most important one for us. We kept believing in our bowling and in our line & length and we got our rewards in that session. We were really patient enough and we believed in what we wanted to do and our game plan did work for us.
“So, I think all in all it was a great day for us. Bowlers did our job and we are really pleased with the effort in this day.”
The link of the video is in the following tweet:
VIDEO: Think @cheteshwar1 could sum up Day 1 at The Oval in under 60 seconds? 🤔🤔⏳ #TeamIndia #ENGvIND
Pujara takes up the 1-minute match report challenge – by @RajalAroraFind out here 📹 https://t.co/nJCWYAZGjL pic.twitter.com/doxXTesoFW
— BCCI (@BCCI) September 8, 2018
