Overview:
Duckett was almost scoring at will. When he reverse-swept Jadeja for a six, India wicketkeeper Rishabh Pant acknowledged its daring by tapping Duckett's arm.
LEEDS, England (AP) — Ben Duckett and Zak Crawley calmly absorbed India pressure to take the total to 117-0 by lunch and become the first set of England openers to score 2,000 runs as a pair since Alastair Cook and Andrew Strauss 13 years ago.
Crawley was happy to let Duckett be the aggressor, and hit his slowest test 50. He was lucky on 42 when Jasprit Bumrah missed a low caught-and-bowled chance. No. 1 test bowler Bumrah hurled 16 overs without a wicket on Tuesday.
“Zak played beautifully and we knew we had to set the tone up,” Duckett told the BBC. “We only had to look at the scoreboard to know that if we batted the overs, we would win the game. There were moments when I thought about stepping into another gear but the breaks in the game helped us to stay calm.”
After lunch, Duckett was dropped on 97 by a diving Yashasvi Jaiswal, angering bowler Mohammed Siraj. That was Jaiswal’s third drop of the match.
Duckett reverse-swept Jadeja for his 14th boundary and his hundred off 121 balls. He jumped and punched the air to celebrate his sixth test hundred and second against India.
But he lost his partner Crawley after a brief rain delay on 65 off 126 balls. The pair achieved the fifth-highest opening stand in the fourth innings in test history, and dropped the odds in England’s favor.
Krishna, who had been going for six an over, was the unlikely wicket-taker. Then he got a second 11 minutes later, Ollie Pope on 8.
Duckett was almost scoring at will. When he reverse-swept Jadeja for a six, India wicketkeeper Rishabh Pant acknowledged its daring by tapping Duckett’s arm.
But he finally fell to a catch in the covers on 149 off 170 balls, including 21 boundaries. Next ball, the barely used Thakur got Harry Brook to nick off for a duck.
England still needed 118 runs and India sensed a chance, but in the middle already was Root, who averages 58 against India.
He and Stokes added 49 together, helped along by India misfields and three poor India reviews. Stokes was out for 33 but Smith came in and hit the winning runs after Root cruised to his 102nd 50-plus score in his 154th test.