Pitching it just right

For the first time in the series, England's bowlers got a pitch which had some pace and bounce in it, and they made excellent use of the track to skittle out the Indian top order and set the game up for their batsmen. The bounce, especially, encouraged the fast bowlers to pitch it short, and expect the ball to bounce much higher than waist high. Andrew Flintoff, resting in dressing-room, had a grin on his face as he watched his bowlers have the Indian batsmen on the hop; had he been on the field with ball in hand, it's entirely possible the match would have been even more one-sided.

The graphic below shows that England's fast bowlers used the short ball quite liberally - they bowled 36 of them in 210 deliveries - that's an average of a little more than one per over.

Once the bowlers had done their job, it was relatively easy for Andrew Strauss and the rest of the batsmen to knock off the target. Strauss led the way with 74 in his first match as captain - only Michael Atherton, with 86 against West Indies at Bridgetown in 1993-94, has scored more in his debut game as skipper.

The result also broke a couple of streaks: India had won eight in a row before coming here, while England had lost six consecutive games when batting second overseas. It also continued India's wretched run in Jamshedpur - they have now lost seven out of nine games they have played here.