India vs England 2023-24

Test matches (5): India 4 (48pts), England 1 (12pts)

On the scheduled fifth day of the final Test, England had a mountain to climb - nothing unusual for touring teams in India. But instead of digging in, with fielders around the bat, most of the squad were hiking to Triund, a hill station at 2,850 metres, with sweeping views of the Dhauladhar mountain range in the Himalayas. Among them were captain Ben Stokes and head coach Brendon McCullum. The surroundings allowed time for reflection on their first series defeat since joining forces in the spring of 2022, a 4-1 result confirmed by a tired performance at Dharamsala.

"When you're exposed the way we have been in the back end of this series, it does require some pretty deep thinking," said McCullum, in his first public criticism of the team. He admitted "refinements" were needed to England's personnel and approach; what had disappointed him most was his team's "timidity" when India were on top, a reference to his batters' loss of clarity, which had previously been their strength. McCullum also accepted they needed to tone down some of their public pronouncements, which smacked at times of arrogance. When, for instance, Ben Duckett was asked how many runs England could chase in the Third Test at Rajkot, he replied: "The more the better." Their subsequent defeat, by 434 runs, was the second-heaviest in their history. "It is fine to inwardly believe what you can achieve, but just be a bit smarter around how we say things sometimes," said McCullum. "It is not arrogance - just confidence in the group."

The Fifth Test marked the halfway point of his four-year contract: Dharamsala was his 23rd game in charge, with another 23 scheduled before his deal expires after the 2025-26 Ashes. England had won 14 and lost eight, but six of the defeats were by Australia and India, and each seemed to lead to a referendum on the Bazball project - an inevitable consequence, perhaps, of challenging some of Test cricket's longest-held conventions.

Whereas England's failure to win the Ashes had been tinged with cruel luck, thanks to the Manchester rain, they could not argue with defeat here. India were deserving winners, recovering from the shock of the First Test at Hyderabad, where they blew a first-innings lead of 190, and making good the absence of series in a row. Indeed, Hyderabad was only their fourth defeat in 51 home Tests since 2012-13, when Alastair Cook's England pulled off a 2-1 win.

McCullum's regret stemmed from the fact that his team had chances in the next three matches; especially costly were third-day collapses at Rajkot and Ranchi. In the main, England tried to stick to their Bazball principles: they had been bold with the selection of uncapped spinners Tom Hartley and Shoaib Bashir, who both enjoyed good series; the team's run-rate of 3.84 was the highest by a visiting side to India in a multi-match series; and they inflicted on Ravichandran Ashwin comfortably his most expensive series economy-rate (4.12).

But India were not to be outdone. Of the series's record 102 sixes, they hit 72, with 26 alone - another record - from Yashasvi Jaiswal, a precocious 22-year-old who blended Test elegance with IPL brutality. Their captain, Rohit Sharma, meanwhile, scored two hundreds, completely outplaying Stokes. If Jaiswal looked the outstanding batsman of India's next generation, there was plenty of other talent on show. Wicketkeeper Dhruv Jurel played a decisive hand in his second Test, scoring 90 in Ranchi and keeping immaculately.

Sarfaraz Khan had a confident strut, having averaged nearly 70 in first-class cricket, and took to the Test arena smoothly, with three fifties in five innings. And seamer Akash Deep marked his debut with a burst of three wickets in 11 balls on the first morning of the Fourth Test. India used 18 players - normally a sign of selectorial confusion, but simply proof of their depth.

This was just as well. On the eve of the series, Virat Kohli had pulled out of the first two Tests citing personal reasons, and did not return; it emerged that his wife, Bollywood actor Anushka Sharma, was heavily pregnant with their second child. K. L. Rahul played in the First Test, before suffering a recurrence of a thigh injury. Ravindra Jadeja missed the Second with a hamstring strain, and Ashwin a day of the Third to visit his unwell mother, while Jasprit Bumrah was rested for the Fourth. Mohammed Shami and Rishabh Pant would have played but for long-standing injuries. India handed debuts to five players, including three batters: Sarfaraz, Rajat Patidar and Devdutt Padikkal. Shubman Gill grew in stature at No. 3, putting a mediocre run behind him to make two hundreds, and averaging 56.

Ashwin, the series' top wicket-taker with 26, played his 100th Test, and became the ninth to reach 500 wickets, though England occasionally got on top of his off-breaks, especially at Hyderabad, where low bounce gave them confidence to sweep. After that, the truer pitches played to Ashwin's strengths: he took five for 51 in Ranchi as England crumbled trying to set up a run-chase, then nine at Dharamsala.

England found it harder to go after Jadeja's left-arm darts and, though he never looked fully fit, he finished with 19 wickets at 25; he dominated the Third Test on his home ground in Rajkot, scoring a century and taking a second-innings five-for. The real star, however, was Kuldeep Yadav, the left-arm wrist-spinner who turned the series with 19 at 20 after he was drafted in for the Second Test at Visakhapatnam. England never consistently read his variations, either from the hand or off the surface.

Bumrah took only one new-ball wicket, but in four Tests found lethal reverse swing, and induced knee-knocking nervousness in England's batsmen. He was at the centre of two of the most talked-about dismissals, detonating Ollie Pope's stumps with a fierce yorker on his way to six for 45 in the Second Test, and having Joe Root caught in the cordon trying to play a reverse ramp in Rajkot, a moment from which England never recovered.

The tourists' youthful spin attack needed the security of above par-totals to compete but, Hyderabad apart, they never materialised. Zak Crawley alone averaged 40, though without a hundred. Root, out of form and runs in the first three Tests, needed the raging debate that followed his reverse ramp to help him refocus. He reverted to his strengths, and at Ranchi scored his first hundred since the Edgbaston Ashes Test the previous June, no doubt benefiting from the absence of Bumrah, who had been tormenting him; Root then massaged his figures with 84 at Dharamsala.

But the two England players who ticked off their 100th Test - Stokes and Bairstow - were largely anonymous. Stokes was rendered strokeless as he struggled to start his innings against spin, and averaged under 20, while Bairstow launched some big sixes but did not reach 40. A middle order of propel the Bazball era, but they averaged 26 between them, and passed 50 only three times. With Ben Foakes deft behind the stumps but short of runs, the debate about the wicket-keeping role rumbled on.

Above them in the order, Pope summed up England's frustration. His 196 in Hyderabad was one of the finest English innings in Asia, but he grew more frantic as the series wore on, and didn't pass 39. His nervousness at the start of an innings spread panic rather than the assurance craved from a No. 3 - especially a player who had been brought into the management group and trusted with the vice-captaincy.

Duckett and Crawley again gave England lively starts, averaging 44 for the first wicket at quicker than four and a half an over. India's bowlers struggled with their lengths, and Rohit seemed hesitant to give the new ball to Ashwin. "I would have loved to bowl at Ben Duckett when he was on zero, and not on 60-70," he said at Rajkot, where Duckett made a superb 153. When Ashwin did open in the second innings of the last two Tests, he dismissed Duckett both times, conjuring up memories of his travails against him seven winters earlier.

England's ability to win from almost any position, as at Hyderabad, had been a hallmark of the McCullum-Stokes partnership, but now they showed a propensity to lose from any position too. The most galling instance came in Ranchi, where they allowed India to rally from 177 for seven to 307, cutting what should have been a big lead to 46. When England collapsed in their second innings, India - after a wobble - chased down 192 to win the series. In the previous game, at Rajkot, England had restricted India to 33 for three, but allowed them to recover to 445. At 224 for two, the tourists were still in the game, but Root's reverse ramp was the first of eight wickets to fall for 95.

With the batting failing consistently after the First Test, an intolerable pressure fell on the bowlers. Mark Wood was largely ineffective on surfaces that sucked the venom from his pace, and Ollie Robinson a massive disappointment in his only Test, at Ranchi, once again succumbing to injury, and struggling to stay on the field. He dropped a crucial catch, and was ignored by Stokes on the fourth day when India chased down their target. There was at least a statistical fillip when, at Dharamsala, James Anderson became the first - and probably last - seamer to reach 700 Test wickets. He had recovered from a poor Ashes series to take ten wickets in four Tests at 33, respectable given the conditions, but there were times when England needed longer spells from their No. 1 seamer.

Stokes made remarkable progress following knee surgery, quietly building up his workloads in the nets until he was fit enough to send down a few overs in match conditions. When he did come on, in the final game, he bowled Rohit with his first ball since July, in one of those eye-blinking moments great cricketers conjure. It had no effect on the match, but was a reminder of his ability to rebalance the side, so long as his left knee stayed strong.

England had selected their spin attack based on "gut feel", according to managing director Rob Key, who along with McCullum and Stokes identified tall bowlers with high release points as the likeliest threat on turning pitches. Stokes had sent Key social-media footage of Bashir bowling to Alastair Cook during Somerset's Championship game against Essex: "Have a look at this - this could be something we could work with on our India tour."

And Bashir, after an upsetting visa wrangle that prevented him from travelling with his team-mates from their pre-tour camp in Abu Dhabi, and ruled him out of the First Test, proved England's best spinner, finishing with 17 wickets at 33. He was the bowler Stokes turned to when he needed a breakthrough, or a long spell; the loss of his county colleague Jack Leach, who injured his knee at Hyderabad, proved surmountable. Bashir belied his lack of first-class experience, and never looked flustered, even when hammered in Dharamsala: after being hit for three sixes in his first over by Jaiswal, he picked up a five-for, to go with the one he collected at Ranchi.

Hartley, too, stuck at it, recovering from a thrashing by Jaiswal in his first spell on debut to win the Hyderabad Test with seven for 62. He was never quite the same threat, but reliably held an end; as well as being England's top wicket-taker, with 22, he was more economical than Ashwin or Jadeja. His batting was punchy too - no England player managed more than his six sixes.

India were made to work for victory, pushed harder by a visiting team than for some time. Stokes's lively tactical brain, and confidence in his bowlers, made England more competitive than their lack of experience suggested but, like so many previous teams here, the batsmen's minds were scrambled by a long series. India's dominance could be summed up by a composite XI, in which it was hard to argue for any England player apart from Root. He outbatted India's various No. 4s, but did not live up to his high standards, or provide the runs England needed to challenge over five Tests.