2 months ago
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The battle between England’s batters and Ravindra Jadeja is going to be vital in this week's second Test at Edgbaston. With the hot weather forecast this week, the wicket could be dry and could spin a lot more than it did at Headingley, especially at the end of the game.
Ben Stokes revealed after the first Test that, during the tea interval on the final day, he asked Ben Duckett for advice on how to play Jadeja. The England captain is a very smart cricketer and is always looking to improve.
And there is nobody better in his dressing room to ask about facing Jadeja than Duckett. The left-handed opener has faced Jadeja in five Tests and has never been dismissed by him, while Stokes has fallen to him seven times. It is an incredible stat and shows just how well Duckett has played him.
Of course, it is easier when you have already scored 50 or so when the spinner comes on, as might be the case for Duckett at the top order. Whereas Stokes bats in the middle order so will often face Jadeja at the start of his innings.
But Duckett is one of the great players of spin in the world. When he hit that reverse-sweep for six off Jadeja at Headingley over extra cover (or mid-wicket, depending on how you look at it), even Rishabh Pant – who had himself scored two centuries in the match – went up to him between overs and gave him a pat on the back.
The first time Duckett played for England, against Bangladesh and India, in 2016 he struggled. The pitches in Bangladesh spun massively and he then came up against one of the great off-spinners against left-handers, India’s Ravi Ashwin, who got him out three times.
It's no wonder Ben Stokes is asking Ben Duckett for his advice on playing Ravindra Jadeja
Ravi Ashwin was all over Duckett in his first stint in Test cricket in 2016 - and it led to an unfair portrayal of his ability against spin
Stokes has now been out to Jadeja seven times in Tests, including a reverse sweep dismissal in the second innings of the first Test last week
Duckett gets extremely low to the ground
The verdict then on Duckett was that he couldn’t play spin. But that really wound him up because he knew it wasn’t true. We have since seen just how good he is against slow bowling.
Duncan Fletcher, who was one of the great coaches of playing spin, always told us to get lower in your stance because it helps you pick up the trajectory of the ball. Being shorter, then, Duckett (5ft 7in) is able to pick up that trajectory and sweep better. Think back to Brian Lara (5ft 8in), Sachin Tendulkar (5ft 5in) and Graham Thorpe (5ft 11in), shorter players who were all great players of spin.
Stokes (6ft) is also a fabulous player of spin, but Joe Root and Harry Brook – who are both tall lads – get lower in their stance than Stokes, with a lower back lift and they pick up the length really well.
The way Stokes got out to Jadeja at Headingley in the second innings, though, was more a case of the wrong shot selection. Stokes is a superb reverse-sweeper, as we famously saw on that ground against Nathan Lyon in 2019.
He rightly went to that shot again against Jadeja because they initially only had one man out on the off-side boundary. But then India changed the field, and they put two men catching behind square.
Once they made that subtle change, I thought Stokes should have stopped playing that shot. When you are reverse-sweeping out of the rough with three men on the off-side behind square, one on the boundary and two catching, the percentages are not in your favour.
When Duckett was doing it, with one man out and one man behind square, the percentages were in his favour, but they weren’t for Stokes, especially with Jadeja finding the rough more by then.
I thought Stokes could have gone to the multitude of other shots he has got – the normal sweep, hit it down the ground for one, get outside off stump and work it to leg, or just kick it out of the rough. There were other options and that is something for Stokes to think about going into Edgbaston.
I was surprised that Stokes didn't put the reverse sweep away when he saw that India had put two catchers behind square
Stokes is a superb reverse-sweeper, as we saw in 2019 at Headingley off Nathan Lyon
Jadeja is coming under pressure after a confusing bowling display on day five at Headingley, with Kuldeep Yadav (right) another option on an Edgbaston pitch that should spin more
There is plenty for Jadeja to ponder as well. I could not believe how long it took him to change the way he bowled on the final day at Headingley. The rough wasn’t extensive to the left-hander, but it was fairly wide and full and yet Jadeja bowled relatively straight to Duckett. He kept missing the rough.
It is different in India when the pitches turn more, but in England you have to look to find where that rough is and he didn’t find it against Duckett. At tea, they must have had a chat because he bowled fuller and wider against Stokes. He made it a real challenge for Stokes, but it was too little, too late.
India could opt to play a second spinner at Edgbaston, with Kuldeep Yadav waiting in the wings. The left-arm wrist-spinner may give you more balls to hit, but he will get more bounce and you will have to pick him because he spins it both ways.
But the question for India is how do they get him in? It would leave them either a batsman or a seamer short. It will be fascinating to see what they do.
