England still require 318 more runs after being set a target of 405 when India were bowled all out for 204 in the afternoon.
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India have their task cut out for Day 5, bowl out England and take the lead in the series.
Where there were fifties from Jonathan Bairstow and Ben Stokes, there were 4-fors from Stuart Broad and Adil Rashid, who now holds maximum wickets in this series.
“When you get injured in the second over of the match, you have no choice but to carry on in pain”, Broad said. Only four teams in the history of Test cricket have been able to chase down 400-plus.
Ajinkya Rahane (26) and Virat Kohli (81) had added another 19 runs in the morning before the collapse began. But, when India turned to the second new ball (and in the process, gave Jadeja’s fingers a rest after 25 overs on the trot had left him with the outstanding figures of 34-14-35-2), the lankier offspin of Jayant Yadav conjured up the ball of the match.
“I think the pressure is on India to go and win the game and I think you could see with Kohli that he is feeling the pressure”, Hussain added. The odd one spat out of the cracked surface, but didn’t interest any of India’s close-in fielders and England duly passed fifty.
But Jayant Yadav and Mohammad Shami had a little more suffering in store for England as the 10th-wicket pair delayed lunch until the belated introduction of Moeen Ali resulted immediately in the stumping of the number 11.
With 33 minutes to tea, England’s first innings folded for in 102.5 overs with a deficit of exactly 200 runs. Fantastic day for us. However, Cook and Hameed showed that if one bats with discipline and shows some fight, the spin can be negated.
Three fours then followed in the space of eight balls, two from Cook and one from Hameed, all of them through the offside. First Kohli failed in his quest to overturn a not out decision from a Jadeja delivery that hit Cook in front. In the very next over, Ashwin (1-28) had a similar experience, as India lost both their appeals quickly.
Hameed launched the spinner down the ground later in the same over in a rare display of aggression and India’s frustration mounted when they used up both reviews in quick succession, with umpire’s call the verdict on both occasions after Cook was struck on the pad.
Cook showed enormous patience en route his 53rd Test half-century which came off 172 balls – his slowest in longest format.
Ravichandran Ashwin beat Cook’s outside edge by a whisker off his third delivery but couldn’t extract the same amount of turn in the next few overs. We got two wickets, we knew it would not be easy to get them out.
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“We are happy with the way things went”.
