A landmark Test for England, Pope, Hartley and reverse-sweeps

Jan 28, 2024, 04:04 AM ET

2 Previous instances of India losing Test matches after taking a 100-plus first-innings lead. They lost to Sri Lanka in Galle after conceding a 192-run lead in 2015, while England overcame a 132-run first-innings deficit in Birmingham in 2022.

65 The previous highest first-innings deficit that a team had overturned to win a Test match against India in India: Australia in Madras (now Chennai) in 1964.

2 Related

15 Test wins for England against India in India, the most by any team, surpassing the 14 by West Indies and Australia.

28 Margin of India’s defeat in Hyderabad is their fourth-narrowest by runs in men’s Tests. Their narrowest defeat while chasing in the fourth innings is by 12 runs against Pakistan at Chepauk in 1999.

6 Bowlers to take a seven-wicket haul on Test debut for England, including Tom Hartley. Dominic Cork’s 7 for 43 against West Indies in the 1995 Lord’s Test was the last such effort. Hartley is also the second England bowler with a seven-for on debut in India, after John Lever, who took 7 for 46 in Delhi in 1976.

7 for 62 Hartley’s bowling figures are the second-best on Test debut for an England spinner. James Langridge bagged 7 for 56 against West Indies in Manchester in 1933.

Ollie Pope plays the reverse sweep BCCI

6 Bowlers to bag seven-plus wickets on debut in the fourth innings of a men’s Test before Hartley. The last of the previous six was Lance Klusener, who took 8 for 64 in 1996, also against India at the Eden Gardens.

190 First-innings deficit that England overcame to win in Hyderabad is the third-highest by them in Tests. They overhauled 261 in Sydney in 1894 and 227 in Leeds in 1981, both against Australia while following on. (England also won after conceding a 248-run lead against South Africa in Centurion in 2000, where both teams forfeited/declared one of their innings)

196 Ollie Pope’s score is the highest in the second innings for England against India in India, surpassing Alastair Cook’s 176 in Ahmedabad in 2012. The 196 by Pope is also the fourth highest for any visiting batter in the second innings against India in India.

413 Runs collectively conceded by R Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja in Hyderabad are the second-most in any of the 50 Test matches they have played together. They conceded 437 runs for 14 wickets against Sri Lanka in Colombo in 2017.

72 Runs scored by England off reverse sweeps in the match are the most by any team in a Test match against spinners since 2015 (as per ESPNCricinfo’s ball-by-ball logs). England batters played 50 reverse sweeps against India’s spinners, hitting them for 14 fours, which are also the most by any team in a Test match.

2012 The last instance of England losing the first Test of a series in Asia, against India in Ahmedabad. The current series against India is the eighth for England in Asia since then, of which they won the first match in six series.