Jamie Smith leads England recovery after Bumrah's four-for
Smith and Carse came together after India picked up 3 for 11 in the first half hour and helped England past 350
ESPNcricinfo staff
11-Jul-2025 • 10 hrs ago

Jasprit Bumrah ended Joe Root's stay • PA Photos/Getty Images
Jasprit Bumrah was saved, or saved himself, for Lord's. The temptation of the most famous honour's board in the world might have had something to do with it and he very nearly wrote himself on it as India started the second day in full flow. India took three wickets in the first five overs - all three the work of their talismanic fast bowler - but a familiar face stalled their progress. Jamie Smith went past 400 runs in the series and walked off at the lunch break with England no longer feeling that queasiness in the stomach that comes with giving up a strong position. They went from 260 for 4 to 271 for 7 but will sit down and dig into the ground's celebrated catering at 353 for 7.
Lord's stood up as one to salute Joe Root when he got the chance the vent the nerves of spending the night on 99, the first ball offering him width that he took on happily. An outside edge squirted away to the deep third boundary to signal the Englishman's 37th Test century - which puts him in the top five in all of Test cricket. He went past Rahul Dravid and Steven Smith.
Bumrah decided he wasn't willing to share the stage anymore. So he sent back both the England captain Ben Stokes and their century maker as well, Root falling to the Indian fast bowler for the 11th time. There was another small victory for the visitors in this period of play when Shubman Gill secured his first successful review on tour to get rid of Chris Woakes.
India continued to challenge the umpires, their irritation sparked by a decision to change the second new ball - a mere 10.3 overs into its use - which was working quite well for them. Gill spent the entire morning drinks break with umpires Paul Reiffel and Sharfuddoula seemingly dissatisfied with the replacement ball. They didn't have to deal with it for long though. Eight overs in, the replacement ball was being replaced.
Away in the background, Smith, who was dropped by KL Rahul on 5, just kept his head down and did his thing. Once more, he led an England lower-order recovery mission, his skillset perfectly suited to the task. A 52-ball half-century was the result of a man concentrating on the job at hand while the opposition was too busy fretting about what could have been. India tried to forget about Smith and blow away the other end, but that didn't work either. Brydon Carse was batting well enough to hit Akash Deep on the up through the covers and getting down on bent knee to slash Bumrah past point.
England's eighth wicket pair had come together in the middle of a crisis. With all the focus on Bumrah and India and the quality of the Dukes balls, they've quietly shifted the balance of the Test match.