Rishabh Pant found another use for the bat that has played some extraordinary shots. Many a batter can feel pain after losing his wicket. India’s vice-captain did, in a different sense, the hobbling hero who had limped out to the middle, finding the way back to the Old Trafford dressing room required the stairs. The bat became a walking stick for the man with the fractured foot.
Pant has played some remarkable innings over the year. The improviser extraordinaire conjured another on a day when he wasn’t expected to be seen at all. The bare fact is that he made 17 runs, with one six and two fours, before Jofra Archer sent his off-stump cartwheeling out of the ground. He did so on one leg, with a foot that was bloodied and swollen from the previous day, when it felt the last sight of him in the series would be when he departed on the golf buggy that masqueraded as an ambulance, his sock off, the damage apparent even before the scans at the hospital.
But when Shardul Thakur was brilliantly caught by Ben Duckett, the cheers were not simply for the fielding. Out came Pant, moving gingerly as if he was wincing with every step. He can often make for compelling cricket. He did once again, but in a rare manner.
Pant, the man who had tried a reverse pull and been injured attempting a reverse sweep the previous day, had less scope to dart around. A batter who sometimes has extravagant footwork used virtually none. It was apparent when Ben Stokes’s first two deliveries to him beat the outside edge. The third reared up off a length and struck him on the glove; hadn’t he suffered enough? Stokes arrowed successive balls in at his pads, as if aiming for the injured foot.
There were shots he may have essayed better when able: he only spooned a full toss from Archer back over the bowler’s head for a single. There were runs that went unrun because he couldn’t run: a shot off Archer almost reached the midwicket fence, but Pant couldn’t make two and, with Jasprit Bumrah at the other end, didn’t want one, so got none. Even the term was wrong. Runs? Pant had to walk them.
But even on one leg, he could do things most could not on two. He managed to heave Archer over midwicket for six; even if it was a slower ball gone wrong, few do that. He brought up his half-century by digging out a Stokes yorker, somehow timing it so well it careered to the cover fence.
There was a shift, too. Pant had resumed his innings after the fall of the sixth wicket. Two more fell as he stood at the other end, Washington Sundar and the debutant Anushul Kamboj going. While Pant had looked vulnerable when he emerged, he outlasted two partners.
He also found himself in a proud tradition of the injured batsmen to bat. There was Colin Cowdrey with his broken arm in 1963, though not facing a ball, Paul Terry shepherding Allan Lamb to a century in 1984. Gordon Greenidge was famously dangerous when limping, a mercurial figure dealing in boundaries when he didn’t want to run.
Pant did not quite reach those levels. He did, though, suggest a second-innings sequel, another exhibition of courage when impaired. And that could actually be his final contribution to a series he has garnished.
He won’t be behind the stumps. And, surely, he won’t be at The Oval. For a second successive Test, though officially playing neither, Dhruv Jurel can keep wicket. He will presumably bat as well at The Oval. England know he can bat: he made 90 against them at Ranchi last year.
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Yet he is unlikely to be as destructive as Pant and, in a series when each game has gone to the last day and when Shubman Gill was sufficiently cautious that he set England 608 to win at Edgbaston, the equation has been altered by the loss of a batter who seemed to have the combination of ability and attitude to hit any bowler out of the attack.
Pant has a capacity to score quickly that, beyond making him box office, had the potential to prove particularly useful for a team who are trailing in the series. His series has produced 479 runs at an average of 68 and a strike rate of 77. Had he batted for an hour on the final day at Lord’s, the chances are that India would have won.
When he faced 58 balls in the second innings at Edgbaston, he blazed his way to 65. His twin centuries at Headingley were both fast and fun. His run out at Lord’s was crucial, his bravery at Old Trafford admirable. He will be missed at The Oval.
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