Axar Patel makes early inroads as England struggle to 74/3 at lunch
Ahmedabad: A scarred England were once again done in by Axar Patel's straight deliveries before partially recovering to reach 74 for 3 at lunch during an intriguing opening session of the fourth and final Test against India here on Thursday.
Brought into action as early as in sixth over, the left-arm orthodox spinner bowled an arm ball which had Dom Sibley (2) leaving a huge gap between bat and pad, trying to play for the spin. The result was an inside edge onto the stumps.
Zak Crawley (8) felt that the easiest way to survive was to attack Patel (9-3-21-2). He got a boundary but then jumped out and lofted the spinner without getting to the pitch of the delivery.
The result was a simple catch to Mohammed Siraj stationed at mid-off, who didn't even have to move an inch from his position.
Joe Root (5), who went off the boil post his double hundred in the first game, got a peach of an inswinger from Siraj (6-0-23-1), which had him caught plumb in-front, leaving his team at 30 for 3 inside the first hour.
Jonny Bairstow (28 batting, 64 balls) after a terrible pink ball Test, looked more assured as he struck six boundaries.
He punished the fast bowlers whenever they offered width and also negotiated Patel's straight deliveries with his bat close to the pads and assured front-foot movement.
Ravichandran Ashwin (3-2-7-0) was introduced into the attack in the 20th over as Virat Kohli kept up the pressure by having Patel continue at one end and rotate his two pacers at the other end.
Ben Stokes (24 batting, 40 balls) showed patience leaving any deliveries outside the off-stump but lofted Ashwin for a six in his very first over.
However, Ashwin got extra bounce and troubled Stokes with a couple of lovely deliveries. The Stokes-Bairstow partnership yielded 44 runs for the unbroken fourth wicket and looked to stem the rot set in by Patel.
The first day Motera pitch didn't have any extraordinary turn on offer for the bowlers and can be safely called good for batsmen if they applied themselves.
After the fall of three wickets, Stokes and Bairstow both showed that they had at least tried to make technical adjustments and were ready to grind it out which is exactly what was needed.
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Pakistan and India, they were going at it, I ended the war: Trump
New York/Pennsylvania (PTI): US President Donald Trump said India and Pakistan “were going at it” and he ended the conflict between the two nuclear-armed neighbours, repeating the claim once again.
Trump has so far repeated the claim nearly 70 times that he stopped the conflict in May between India and Pakistan.
“In 10 months, I ended eight wars, including Kosovo (and) Serbia, Pakistan and India, they were going at it. Israel and Iran, Egypt and Ethiopia.… Armenia and Azerbaijan,” Trump said on Tuesday in remarks to his supporters at a rally on the economy in Mount Pocono, Pennsylvania.
India launched Operation Sindoor on May 7, targeting terror infrastructure in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir in retaliation for the April 22 Pahalgam attack that killed 26 civilians.
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India and Pakistan reached an understanding on May 10 to end the conflict after four days of intense cross-border drone and missile strikes.
India has consistently denied any third-party intervention in resolving the conflict.
Meanwhile, Trump said Cambodia and Thailand have started fighting again and “tomorrow”, he will make a phone call to those countries.
“Who else could say I'm going to make a phone call and stop a war of two very powerful countries, Thailand and Cambodia. They are going at it. But I’ll do it. So we're making peace through strength. That's what we're doing,” Trump said.
On immigration, Trump said that for the first time in 50 years, “we now have reverse migration, which means more jobs, better wages and higher income for American citizens, not for illegal aliens.”
He said that he has announced a permanent pause on “Third World migration”, including from “hellholes" like Afghanistan, Haiti, Somalia and many other countries.
“…Why can't we have some people from Norway, Sweden, just a few. Let's have a few from Denmark. Do you mind sending us a few people? Send us some nice people. Do you mind? But we always take people from Somalia, places that are a disaster, right? Filthy, dirty, disgusting, ridden with crime. The only thing they're good at is going after ships.”
Last month, Trump had said he would “permanently pause" migration from “all Third World Countries” and deport foreign nationals who are a “security risk” as his administration intensified its crackdown on immigration in the wake of the killing of a National Guard member by Afghan national Rahmanullah Lakanwal.
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US Citizenship and Immigration Services issued new guidance allowing for “negative, country-specific factors” to be considered when vetting aliens from 19 high-risk countries.
These countries are Afghanistan, Burma, Burundi, Chad, the Republic of the Congo, Cuba, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Laos, Libya, Sierra Leone, Somalia, Sudan, Togo, Turkmenistan, Venezuela and Yemen.
These are the same countries that were subject to a travel ban announced by Trump in a proclamation issued in June this year.
The proclamation ‘Restricting the Entry of Foreign Nationals to Protect the United States from Foreign Terrorists and Other National Security and Public Safety Threats' restricted and limited the entry of nationals of these countries into the US and applied to both immigrants and nonimmigrants.
