Edgbaston| "Form of his life" is one term that Jonny Bairstow is displaying at the moment for England. Right now Bairstow is batting on an auto-pilot mode and he is in no mood to stop. Be it any opposition, be it any ground or any condition, Jonny Bairstow makes sure that he bails England out of difficult conditions. Last year around, when India had toured England for their red ball series, the English batsmen especially Jonny Bairstow struggled against Jasprit Bumrah who is leading the Indian team in the fifth Test match that is being played at Edgbaston.
The Indian pacers were rattled straightaway with Alex Lees and Zack Crawley stitching an aggressive partnership of 100 runs. With the new ball taken, India changed their fortunes by claiming three quick wickets and that put the hosts under huge pressure. This was India's chance to tighten their grip on the match but they goofed up with their game plans and their fielding placement.
With the ball reversing and with Root and Bairstow struggling initially, skipper Bumrah made things extremely easy for both the batsmen by opening up the field. Sensing the opportunity bat hand, Joe Root and Jonny Bairstow kept on rotating the strike and at one point it felt like both the teams are playing ODI cricket.
Things kept on getting worst for India as Hanuma Vihari dropped Jonny Bairstow when he was on 14. With the kind of form Bairstow is in, he is going to make any team pay if he is dropped. Bairstow along with Root executed their plans properly and at the end of day 4, England required just 119 runs to win the final Test with Root and Bairstow stitching a partnership of 150 runs.
When play resumed on day 5, Bairstow and Root started on auto-pilot mode and looked in a hurry to finish the match off. In the process, Bairstow scored 114* off 145 deliveries with 15 boundaries and 1 six.
Here is how Twitter reacted:
England Playing XI: Alex Lees, Zak Crawley, Ollie Pope, Joe Root, Jonny Bairstow, Ben Stokes, Sam Billings, Matty Potts, Stuart Broad, Jack Leach, James Anderson
India Playing XI: Shubman Gill, Cheteshwar Pujara, Hanuma Vihari, Virat Kohli, Shreyas Iyer, Rishabh Pant, Ravindra Jadeja, Shardul Thakur, Mohammed Shami, Mohammed Siraj, Jasprit Bumrah
