Indian pacer Umesh Yadav impressed one and all with his outstanding bowling performance during the first innings against England in the ongoing fourth Test at Kennington Oval in London. The right-armer picked up three wickets for 76 runs in 19 overs, including two maidens.
Yadav gave the visitors a great start picking two wickets early in the morning on the second day to reduce England at 65/5. Despite such a start, the home team managed to reach 290, taking a lead of 99 runs over India.
The likes of Ollie Pope and Chris Woakes shined with the bat, smashing respective half-centuries to inspire England’s comeback. But what exactly went wrong for the tourists after a stunning start on the second day? Well, Yadav himself shared his thoughts regarding that while speaking to reporters at the virtual press conference.
Yadav admitted that they made some errors that were capitalised by the English batters who got the momentum back. He reckoned that quick runs were given away in the middle phase, which shouldn’t have happened.
“The way we started our bowling, within 40 minutes, we took two wickets, after that we can say it was a drift down, as we conceded 40-45 runs in seven or eight overs, then the batsmen got the rhythm back and came inflow, they also came to know what is to be done,” said Yadav.
“You are trying everything, but there is no support from the wicket, and then after that, after bowlers concede fours, batsmen are on the upper hand, and they want to be dominant. I feel we made a mistake, the way we took wickets, we should have kept tight, but I feel a bit more runs were conceded in the middle phase, which shouldn’t have been the case,” added Yadav.
After bundling out England for 290, Indian openers did pretty well to hang around before the officials announced the stumps. Rohit Sharma (20 no) and KL Rahul (22 no) took India’s total to 43/0.
