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Match facts

October 8-12, 2016
Start time 0930 local (0400 GMT)1:17

Injuries plague India-New Zealand series

Big Picture

As we move from Kanpur’s correct Hindi to Kolkata’s formal and slightly archaic English to the delightful informal mix of Hindi and Urdu in Indore, one thing has not changed. Kanpur’s Green Park is a 10-minute walk from the district court. One of Kolkata’s Eden Garden’s ends is called the High Court End. And now Indore’s Holkar Stadium turns out to be located under a kilometre from the Madhya Pradesh High Court. It is fitting considering a larger court’s shadow has loomed while the series has gone on.The Kanpur press box was used by Kapil Dev, Sunil Gavaskar and Ravi Shastri to further the BCCI’s old guard’s view; president Anurag Takur himself made a visit to the Eden Gardens press box. None of it could make you look away from some high-quality Test cricket watched by encouraging crowds barring the second day of Kolkata. Indore, making its Test debut, has thrown up thousands to just watch the nets; this Test should be a spectacle too.The scoreboard reads 2-0 India, which is obviously a fair indicator, but the margins of defeats – 197 runs and 178 runs – don’t do New Zealand justice. R Aswhin, the series’ leading bowler, was gracious enough to acknowledge the fight New Zealand have shown despite injuries and limited experience in such challenging conditions. “The best thing about this New Zealand team is they don’t give anything easily,” Ashwin told . “They have come with a gameplan, and it is really showing. They are making us work very hard for every single wicket and run.”As New Zealand try to avoid a whitewash against the No. 1-ranked Test side in the world, they will be buoyed by the return of their captain Kane Williamson, who missed the Kolkata Test because of illness. Williamson said he was “certainly very hopeful” of playing as he worked to get his energy levels back up after a virus attack. It’s not just New Zealand who have had to fight injuries and illnesses. India have lost Ishant Sharma and Bhuvneshwar Kumar from their bowling department. The loss of two openers – KL Rahul and Shikhar Dhawan – will result in uncertainty at the top as Gautam Gambhir looks to come back once again, at a week short of 35.India have kept finding ways to win crucial moments and sessions in this series. With uncertainty around their board, they will need to keep finding ways if they are to realise their unstated – for obvious reasons of not putting too much pressure on themselves – dream of going unbeaten through the whole home season.

Form guide

India WWDWD (last five completed matches, most recent first)
New Zealand LLLDWKane Williamson said he was “certainly very hopeful” of playing in Indore•BCCI

In the spotlight

Tom Latham, who doesn’t play too much limited-overs cricket at the international level, has never played in such heat and humidity. He has fought awfully hard for 455 minutes in the middle, but has still been able to get only 135 runs in four innings. He has been playing a game that doesn’t come naturally to him, which has brought him the respect of the opposition, but he will want to play that big innings that defines a match.Rohit Sharma paid back the first instalment for the faith shown in him by the team management when he scored 82 runs coming in at 43 for 4 in India’s second innings in Kolkata. His critics worry this might just be a one-off. Now the second-highest run-scorer in the series, Rohit himself said he has not been under any pressure; even if he was, this innings should have eased it, but he will also know the next instalment should not take too long.New Zealand spinners are rarely asked to win Tests on their own. They are usually asked to do the containing role to support their quicks. As in Kanpur, they will again be asked to win New Zealand the Test. Right now they average 35 (Micthell Santner), 50 (Ish Sodhi) and 58 (Jeetan Patel). They will need to cut out the loose balls for starters, and then give the ball enough opportunity to assume the natural variation off a pitch that looks dry.

Team news

India have lost Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Shikhar Dhawan from the last Test. Gambhir should replace Dhawan, and depending on the nature of the pitch either Umesh Yadav or Amit Mishra should come in. A left-field selection could mean a debut for either paceman Shardul Thakur or offspinner Jayant Yadav.India (probable): 1 M Vijay, 2 Gautam Gambhir, 3 Cheteshwar Pujara, 4 Virat Kohli (capt.), 5 Ajinkya Rahane, 6 Rohit Sharma, 7 R Ashwin, 8 Wriddhiman Saha (wk), 9 Ravindra Jadeja, 10 Mohammed Shami, 11 Amit Mishra/ Umesh YadavWilliamson’s return will mean Henry Nicholls misses out with Martin Guptill expected to be given another chance. Matt Henry’s impressive performance in Kolkata could mean he stays in and Neil Wagner makes way for the third spinner Ish Sodhi.New Zealand (probable): 1 Tom Latham, 2 Martin Guptill, 3 Kane Williamson (capt.), 4 Ross Taylor, 5 Luke Ronchi, 6 Mitchell Santner, 7 BJ Watling (wk), 8 Matt Henry/Neil Wagner, 9 Jeetan Patel, 10 Ish Sodhi, 11 Trent Boult

Pitch and conditions

The Indore pitch is known to provide assistance for quicks and value for shots, but don’t expect it at the cost of home advantage. The word is that the pitch is expected to behave similarly to Kanpur. Virat Kohli said it was a hard surface, which should have some carry. Williamson, though, said the pitch was soft and bare at both ends. He expected turn, but also felt that the softness of the pitch with the weather around was a factor. There has been some rain around in the lead-up to the Test, but the forecast is for an uninterrupted match.

Stats and trivia

• Virat Kohli has won all his six tosses at home
• India have been unbeaten in their last 13 home Tests. They have won 11 and drawn two
• Samandar Singh Chauhan, the curator at Holkar Stadium, is the man responsible for the pitches that gave ODI cricket its first two double-hundreds. Sachin Tendulkar did it in Gwalior, and Virender Sehwag here
• Martin Guptill, Ross Taylor and BJ Watling have averaged under 20 in this series

Quotes

“One thing that stands out for me as a learning is how to control a session that’s not going your way. The session when the other team is batting well, you should know how to control runs and at the same time not go negative.”
“We know we are up against a stiff challenge in India but at the same time we are yet to have played our best cricket. Although we’ve come off the back of a couple of losses we do feel if we can put out our best performance we can get a result in this part of the world. But we certainly need to improve on our last couple.”

Group A

Fast bowlers Krishnamoorthy Vignesh and Aswin Crist helped Tamil Nadu compete against Mumbai in Lahli. Vignesh finished with 5 for 41 on debut, while Crist returned figures of 3 for 51 as they made sure Tamil Nadu – who had been all out for 87 – conceded a first-innings lead of only 89 runs.Openers Washington Sundar and Abhinav Mukund then wiped out that deficit with a 107-run stand that shifted the momentum firmly in Tamil Nadu’s favour. However, Dhawal Kulkarni broke the partnership to open a passage of play in which six wickets fell for the addition of just 43 runs. Debutant left-arm spinner Vijay Gohil did most of the damage, taking 3 for 36. Tamil Nadu went to stumps with a lead of 64 and only four wickets in hand.Harpreet Singh raced to an unbeaten double-century to help Madhya Pradesh post 465 from an overnight total of 292 for 7. Seamers Ishwar Pandey and Gaurav Yadav then reduced Uttar Pradesh to 131 for 5 as Madhya Pradesh established a dominant position by stumps on day two in Hyderabad.In the morning, resuming on 112, Harpreet hit 104 of the 173 runs Madhya Pradesh added. He was well supported by Ankit Sharma, who scored 61 off 97 in an eighth-wicket stand that yielded 155 runs in 208 balls. Madhya Pradesh maintained a run-rate of almost 5 in the 36 overs they faced.With the ball, Pandey made the first breakthrough and Yadav made the next three, before the run-out of Piyush Chawla left Uttar Pradesh struggling at 96 for 5. Eklavya Dwivedi and Kuldeep Yadav saw them through to stumps without any further losses.Uday Kaul and Gurkeerat Singh scored unbeaten fifties in an unbroken 110-run fifth-wicket stand to rescue Punjab and take them to 154 for 4 against Railways in Delhi.This was after Siddarth Kaul dismissed Railways’ overnight batsman, Ashish Yadav (81) Shivakant Shukla (128), and then removed Anureet Singh to complete his five-wicket haul. Overall, Punjab took 5 for 74 in the day and bowled Railways out for 331.In their reply, Punjab were reduced to 44 for 4 by the Railways quicks, before Uday Kaul (59*) and Gurkeerat (66*) put up resistance.Baroda declared on 544 for 8, before Gujarat‘s openers survived 15 overs to stumps on another batsman’s day in Jaipur.Resuming on 285 for 2, Baroda’s overnight batsmen Aditya Waghmode and Deepak Hooda added a further 57 runs before their 175-run third-wicket partnership was broken. By that stage, Hooda had got 118; Waghmode was dismissed shortly after for 142.Contributions of 47 from Hardik Pandya and 66 not out from Swapnil Singh took Baroda past 500. Gujarat’s openers, Samit Gohel and Priyank Kirit Panchal, closed out the day at 34 for 0.

Scorecard1:21

‘My game plan is to get off strike’ – Ronchi

In the second innings of their warm-up match against Mumbai, Luke Ronchi and Martin Guptill combined to give the New Zealand team management a selection headache sooner than they would have anticipated. While Guptill followed his first-innings failure with a duck, Ronchi scored a blistering century on a last-day pitch that had begun to misbehave.It would be a dramatic move if a batsman who has opened only three times in first-class cricket replaced an opener in whom New Zealand have invested, but if there ever was a time and a place to do so, this might be it. Guptill averages 29.59 in Tests, which drops to 20.68 in Asia. He may be sensational in limited-overs cricket, but Tests and spin have not been his best friends. Concurrently, there is no better place than Asia for a non-opener to think about converting. It is often the best time to bat, before the ball begins to turn, reverse swing or gets too soft to travel.Ronchi got his crack at a top-order spot in the second innings, much like his previous three forays playing for Western Australia before he moved to New Zealand. Mumbai declared immediately after Siddhesh Lad’s century – the third of their innings. Then, out walked Ronchi alongside Guptill, the only specialist batsman who did not get a long hit in the first innings. With it being the third day of the game, the flat pitch had dried out and was offering turn and variable bounce, enough for Mumbai to open with the left-arm spin of Vishal Dabholkar.But Guptill can’t blame the pitch for his dismissal. In Dabholkar’s first over, the batsman edged a half-volley, seemingly playing inside the line of the ball and giving the slip fielder an easy catch. Ronchi looked in much better control, and displayed more scoring options against spin and the slow nature of the pitch. He swept with authority, drove the quicks with power, found gaps repeatedly and was difficult to pin down at one end for the pressure to build.”My game plan is to get off strike,” Ronchi said after the match. “If the field is in, I go over the top. [A] couple over the top, then a few gaps, and get off strike. That’s the way I go about it. If it works, fantastic. Doesn’t work all the time, but the best way to bat sometimes is to be at the other end. If you can get yourself off strike, it is a good thing.”Even if New Zealand were to stay conservative and don’t open with Ronchi, he might be quite useful in the middle order. Almost all of his 107 runs came in the company of bowlers. The New Zealanders used the final day of the game to give chances to those who didn’t get them in the first innings. Guptill and Henry Nicholls were the only specialist batsmen repeated before they had no choice but to send others in. Ronchi put on 23, 64 and 47 runs with Mitchell Santner, Doug Bracewell and Trent Boult respectively. Batting with the tail could prove crucial on raging turners; Ravindra Jadeja frequently gave India the match-tilting runs from around 120 for 6 in the series against South Africa.Asked if he might have staked a claim for the opening position, Ronchi said: “Maybe, but it’s just the position I was given in the second innings – to go out and open. [I] just wanted to sort of have a hit and do as best as I possibly could. If it comes up I certainly won’t say no, but you never know what Hess [Mike Hesson] and Kane [Williamson] are thinking. So I will just go about my business and do the best I can for my team whenever given the chance, I guess.”I have no idea [what role they have in mind for me]. It’s up to them. Whatever they say, I will try to do my best. If given a chance, that is. If I am not playing, I am not playing. If I am playing and batting at 11, I am more than happy. Whatever role they ask me to perform, I certainly won’t say no.”If New Zealand do want Ronchi in, Nicholls may in danger of going out. He scored 1 in the second innings, but was undone by a ball that jumped out of the rough. If Nicholls does play the first Test in Kanpur, as a middle-order batsman, he would have to face one of the most difficult spin environments without any prior experience. Going into that with 30 runs from two innings would not make him feel good.This is when just one warm-up match on such a tough tour becomes unfair. A batsman needs time out in the middle to develop the methods and confidence to play spin. As another example, Santner jumped out of the crease to try to get to the pitch of a ball, and was stumped off Lad. He bats in the lower order for New Zealand and his runs could be very crucial. If selected for the Test, and having failed against a part-timer in a practice match, will he have the confidence to run at R Ashwin or Jadeja?The odd misbehaving delivery aside, New Zealand batted relatively comfortably through the rest of the day. They were bowled out for 235 in the fourth of the mandatory 15 overs in the last hour of play, but Mumbai did not take up the chase of 96 in nine overs.

Mark Wood is not a Geordie sure of his place in the England fast-bowling pecking order – but he is glad to be back. Figures of 1 for 57 on his first ODI appearance in almost a year were not as arresting as the fact that his fastest delivery was clocked at 92.7mph, during a hostile opening spell in which he helped put Pakistan on the back foot in the first match of the series in Southampton.Following two operations on his left ankle, and ten months out of the England side, Wood has hurtled back into contention following a series of vibrant displays. A couple of his one-day squad-mates can attest to that, after a searing contribution to Durham’s NatWest Blast semi-final win over Yorkshire on Saturday, in which he gave Joe Root a torrid working-over – five balls, several hurried prods, one run – and yorked Jonny Bairstow on the way to career-best T20 figures of 4 for 25.Root, whose 61 helped England to a comfortable DLS victory on Wednesday, could barely lay a bat on Wood in their Finals Day encounter – a problem he has solved by giving it away to his tormentor. For Wood, it has been an immensely satisfying comeback after missing most of the winter and half of the English season recovering from his injured ankle.”I had more than a little bit of frustration over the last few months,” Wood said. “To come back with Durham so strongly is amazing. The coach there, Jon Lewis, and the way that the whole England medical team have looked after me, they deserve huge credit. Jon Lewis basically said to not worry about going for runs and to concentrate on taking wickets and that confidence and getting a few wickets and playing the role that I did at Durham gave me the confidence to come back to the England set-up fresh.”That was my best Twenty20 bowling performance for sure. I haven’t seen the paces but a couple of the Yorkshire lads said I bowled well and getting that recognition from international players is always nice. One of them in particular is a pretty good batsman so I was very happy that he was saying it was tough and I even just swapped a bat with him now so that must be some sort of recognition. I think it’s because I bowled so well at him, Joe obviously wasn’t so fond of that one so he’s given it to me.”The surgery has allowed Wood to play without discomfort in his ankle when bowling and he believes that will enable him to maintain his pace from spell to spell, in particular over back-to-back matches, an area where there were previously concerns about his durability.”I would say I’m consistently quicker,” he said. “I wouldn’t say quicker at my top speed, but I have not got the pain in the back of my ankle, which was causing me huge problems. People were saying I could not play back-to-back games, but it wasn’t that I couldn’t play back-to-back, [it was that] I couldn’t bowl at 90mph every day and I’m a totally different bowler bowling 90mph to when I am bowling 80mph. I need that pace and with no pain in the back of my ankle, I find that a lot easier on my body and that allows me to do that. Consistently it is a lot better for me.”While Wood at top speed ranks among the quickest bowlers currently playing the game, he is less concerned than some about raw pace – “the analyst gets quite worked up when I come in and he says ‘you’re bowling at 92′” – and recognises he is more likely to be judged for England on wickets and economy. As Wood’s first over, in which Sharjeel Khan picked up two boundaries, demonstrated, extra velocity can sometimes cut both ways. “I think the third ball, off Sharjeel’s bat, went about 98mph, so he was winning that one.”Mark Wood consistently topped 90mph on his ODI comeback for England•Getty Images

Not that Wood will be looking to dial it down in pursuit of something more metronomically reliable. Having returned midway through the season, he has dived headlong into competitive action and believes he could still bowl quicker yet.”I reckon I could, yeah. When you get that rhythm and match fitness back,” he said. “I’ve been rushed back through to get some game-time having missed the first half of the summer, and I’ve been desperate to play so I’ve not really had that time where I’ve been getting used to bowling and bowling again. I’ve only played two Championship games, and in one of those I only bowled 14 overs. So if I get that match fitness back up, hopefully I can bowl even quicker.”Wood formed part of a three-man pace attack at the Ageas Bowl, alongside Chris Woakes and Liam Plunkett. With David Willey hopeful of returning to action after the hand injury he sustained on Finals Day, Chris Jordan and Jake Ball also in the squad, Steven Finn recuperating from a hamstring tear and James Anderson and Stuart Broad filling out the options for the Test side, England look like having a considerable seam battery to call upon.For now, Wood is focused on proving himself worthy of a place – England have still to see the best of him in ODIs, with six wickets from eight appearances at an average of 66.83 – but there is another layer of uncertainty due to his contractual situation at Durham. Should his central contract not be renewed by the ECB, there are doubts about whether Durham could afford to retain him, but reigniting his international career remains the quickest (in every sense) route to a resolution.”It’s complicated off the field at Durham, everyone knows there are issues there,” Wood said. “My situation is to focus solely on getting back in the England team first. I love the north-east, I’m a north-east lad.”Am I confident of a central contract? I wouldn’t say so, but I know that part of the reason that we give out central contracts is to look after fast bowlers and things like that. If I was to fall into that category that would be brilliant. Getting looked after by such a superb medical team that I talked about before, they’ve been superb with us. They’ve looked after me tremendously well, to be honest.”So I wouldn’t say I’m confident because I’ve not played for England for a long time, and throughout this year I probably haven’t deserved to get another one, so we’ll just have to wait and see. But in terms of Durham, I’m focusing on England at the moment and I’ll see what happens there come September.”

England women 138 for 7 (Wilson 43*) beat Pakistan 103 (Gunn 2-7) by 35 runs
ScorecardFran Wilson’s career-best unbeaten 43 helped ride a middle order wobble•Getty Images

Fran Wilson top-scored in her first international appearance in more than five years, while Amy Jones once again restated her qualities as Sarah Taylor’s replacement behind the stumps, as England’s women were forced to battle hard for the ascendancy before sealing a comfortable 35-run victory in the second T20 against Pakistan at the Ageas Bowl in Southampton.In the end, England’s depth proved the difference, as Pakistan’s middle- and lower-order faded after a spirited start to their pursuit of 139. They lost their last four wickets for 19 runs in 36 balls, with Jenny Gunn, England’s veteran allrounder, returning the ultra-parsimonious figures of 2 for 7 in four overs of wicket-to-wicket medium pace.However, after the power-hitting exploits that had marked England’s victories in the first four matches of the tour, their performance on Tuesday was a timely reminder of the fragilities that still exist in a line-up that has been significantly remodelled since their disappointing World T20 campaign in March.After winning the toss, Heather Knight chose to bat first on a flat surface with tantalisingly short boundaries – apparently the rope was brought in to the minimum 55 metre-mark at the behest of England’s coach, Mark Robinson. However, the captain herself struck the only six of the innings as Pakistan responded to the challenge by bringing their spinners to the fore – all four of them, whose tidy and threatening lines of attack exposed an England batting line-up that had hardly been called upon all summer, due in no small part to the towering success of their opening partnership.The match began, sure enough, with an extension of a formidable record for Lauren Winfield and Tammy Beaumont. The pair had come into the game with 664 runs between them in three ODIs and one T20 to date, including seven sixes and 83 fours at a strike-rate of 110.48. And, when Winfield began her day’s work with three fours from the first four balls of Aiman Anwar’s international career, it seemed the summer’s narrative was set to continue.But then Aiman hit back at the end of her second over, trapping Beaumont lbw for 5 with an inswinging yorker that replays suggested would have missed the stumps. There on, England lost a touch of fluency to their batting. Winfield was badly dropped at extra cover off the bowling of Sadia Yousuf, the left-arm spinner, but then picked out long-off from her very next delivery – Aiman, right in the thick of the action, held a well-judged chance right on the edge of the rope to reduce England to 44 for 2 in the seventh over.Natalie Sciver, England’s hard-hitting allrounder, got off the mark first ball with a cut for two through point, but fireworks proved elusive as she and Knight failed to make the most of their starts – Knight was excellently stumped by Sidra Nawaz as Nida Dar, the offspinner, slid a wide one across her bows, before Sciver fell one over later, caught at long-on as she attempted to up the ante against Yousuf’s left-arm spin.It was left to Wilson to apply some gloss to the latter stages of England’s innings – her 43 nor out from 39 balls featured three fours, including an excellent one-bounce thump for four down the ground from the penultimate ball of the innings as Pakistan’s deep-set field, which had previously challenged the batsmen to clear the rope or settle for the single, was finally pierced by the best shot of the innings.But thanks in part to England’s improved running between the wickets, a total of 138 for 7 always promised to be a touch out of Pakistan’s reach, not least after a frantic first over from Katherine Brunt. Having been run out for 3 in the final over of England’s innings, Brunt’s mood quickly worsened when Sidra Ameen’s first-ball mow was caught by Jones behind the stumps but over-ruled for a front-foot no-ball. Two balls later, however, Ameen was sent on her way for a duck – run out by a direct hit from Danielle Wyatt at point, after a tentative poke from Javeria Khan had been spilled in the gully by Knight.Jones then showcased her class as a wicketkeeper in Sciver’s opening over, as she held her shape to a very wide swipe from Bismah Maroof and clung onto a thick edge to reduce Pakistan to 8 for 2. Javeria hit back with power and placement, taking advantage of the Powerplay with five fours in a 17-ball 23, before Knight induced Jones’ third catch and second dismissal of the innings, another ambitious swipe that led to a backpedalling chance.Pakistan refused to relinquish hope as they carried on going for their strokes, particularly across the line, but aside from one powerful connection for six from Asmavia Iqbal – her 13th in T20s, more than any other Pakistan player – they struggled to keep in touch with a mounting run-rate. Sophie Ecclestone, the 17-year-old left-arm spinner, once again displayed her composure in picking off two late wickets, before Danielle Hazell secured an unassailable 2-0 series lead by having Nida caught in the deep by Brunt with two balls of the innings left unused.