Mumbai: India crashed to a humiliating 10-wicket defeat against England on fourth day of the Wankhede Stadium here today and allowed the visitors to level the series 1-1.
England had dominated the entire match and humiliated India in their own den. The toss was vital but England never made a heavy weather out of it. They remained focussed on their job and after restricting India to 327 in the first innings, piled 413 taking a lead of 85 runs.
It was the skipper Alastair Cook (122) and Kevin Pietersen (186) who led from the front and toyed with Indian spinners. It was Cook’s second back to back century. Cook as resolute and patient as ever played the role of an anchor, while the stylish hander tore apart the Indian attack.
The spin duo of Monty Panesar and Graeme Swann were at the task again and reduced India to 117-7 at stumps on day.
Starting the day on the back-foot hoping for a miracle with overnight batsmen Gautam Gambhir and Harbhajan Singh, they could not have expected for a worse start than this.
Harbhajan Singh was out in the second over of the day after his attempted cut off a Graeme Swann’s rising delivery took an edge and an alert Jonathan Trott in the first slip did well to complete the catch.
Zaheer Khan was the next man to go after he tried slogging a flighted delivery off Monty Panesar, but got a top edge to be caught comfortably by Matt Prior.
With Gambhir along with Pragyan Ojha at the other end was looking determined but a faulty decision by umpire Tony Hill cut short his resistance. He was the last man to be dismissed.
Gambhir was adjusted lbw of Swann’s bowling while the replay clearly showed a thick inside edge from the bat.
Panesar who was the wrecker-in-chief in the first innings performed brilliantly in the second innings as well and picked up his second consecutive five wicket haul. He took 6-81, while Swann took rest of the four wickets.
Out of the 20 Indians wickets, these two have accounted for 19 of them. Panesar took 11 wickets while Swann dismissed eight Indian batsmen in the match.
Gambhir was the stand out performer for India in the second innings and scored a valiant 65 off 142 balls including six boundaries.
Needing just 57 runs to win the match, England openers Nick Compton (30) and Cook (18) reached the target in just 9.4 overs.
England 413 (Cook 122, Pietersen 186, Ojha 5-143) and 58 for 0 beat India 327 (Pujara 135, Panesar 5-129) and 142 (Gambhir 65, Panesar 6-81) by ten wickets
By Indian Sports News Network