Cricket betting tips: England v India second Test preview for Lord's
Lord's stages the second Test between England and India on Thursday, and Richard Mann has a range of bets to consider.
Cricket tips: England v India second Test, August 12-16
3pts India to beat England at 7/5 (Betway, bet365)
2pts Ollie Robinson top England bowler at 3/1 (Betfair, Paddy Power)
1pt Ravindra Jadeja Man of the Match at 20/1 (bet365)
1pt Rohit Sharma Man of the Match at 12/1 (Sky Bet, bet365)
1pt India to win the series 3-0 at 14/1 (bet365, William Hill)
1pt India to win the series 4-0 at 18/1 (General)
England are in trouble.
True to form, their excellent seam attack kept them in the game in last week’s first Test before Joe Root stood tall to compile what was one of the best hundreds made by an Englishman for some time, in the process giving his side a shot at victory that was ultimately thwarted by the weather. But, for long periods at Trent Bridge, England were second best to a strong Indian side and the omens aren’t good for the remainder of the summer. England are indeed in trouble. Big trouble.
Much of the pre-series talk was about England’s misfiring top six – Root apart – and how they would cope with Ben Stokes’ absence. Still, England fans could at least console themselves with the hope that that only Virat Kohli, and to a lesser extent, Cheteshwar Pujara, have enjoyed considerable success on these shores in the past. Sadly for Root and head coach Chris Silverwood, while 32 from Sam Curran was the highest score after Root by an Englishman in Nottingham, KL Rahul put together a composed 84 in the first innings while there were runs for Rohit Sharma and a half-century for Ravindra Jadeja.
England’s batting, and in particular the top order, looks a notch below Test standard, while India appear to have spent the weeks following the ICC Championship Test final working hard and learning about these conditions. Even without contributions from Kohli and Pujura, India were the better side last week.
That is quite a statement to make given Rahul only found himself back in the side due to two injuries, while experienced and world-class performers Ravi Ashwin and Ishant Sharma couldn’t even make the starting XI.
More significantly, India were able to boss England at their own game on a ground and in conditions that really ought to have played to strengths of the hosts: a grass-laden Trent Bridge wicket, favourable overhead conditions for swing bowlers throughout, and having won the Toss and batted first at a venue where that has historically proven to be a big advantage.
Moeen recalled but batting concerns remain
With sunshine forecast for the early part of the second Test, and the wicket at Lord’s generally good for batting once the early punches have been thrown, England might feel they have missed their chance, while India will be looking at the schedule with glee. With Leeds to come, and the long-range weather forecast hinting at an impending heatwave, followed by The Oval and Old Trafford – grounds that generally favour pace and spin more than swing and seam – things are falling nicely into place for the visitors who trump their hosts in the spin department and boast a top six as destructive as any in the world when the going is good.
Rohit, Rahul and to a lesser extent, Rishabh Pant, might have had to curb their natural instincts last week, but give them some good weather and flat pitches and things could get ugly.
England’s decision to draft Moeen Ali in for the second Test makes perfect sense: they need to pick a spinner from here on in but don’t want to weaken an already flimsy batting line-up by replacing Curran with Jack Leach. It is desperately unfair on Leach who bowled brilliantly all winter and deserves more opportunities, but he is suffering because of the ineptitude of the batsmen in this team.
Of those batsmen, Zak Crawley’s position at number three is in grave danger given he is currently only averaging 11.14 this year, though Dom Sibley and his inability to transfer pressure onto the opposition has put his neck on the block and an average of only 21.56 in 2021 hardly helps his case either.
I suspect Sibley might go this week, with Haseeb Hameed finally earning the recall that has been coming since he started to turn his career around at Nottinghamshire. Whether genuine pace of the kind Jasprit Bumrah can generate will cause issues for his low hands remains to be seen – a genuine concern with Australia on the horizon – but Sibley has played 21 Tests now and though his career average of 30.32 is far from shameful for an opening batsman in England, he hasn’t done enough to win people over.
The promise of true pitches in Australia and a Kookaburra ball that doesn’t swing too much is clearly persuading England to stick with the more dynamic Crawley, so I wouldn’t be surprised if he were to get another go at Lord’s before Dawid Malan surely comes under discussion. For now, Root might be tempted to shift to number three for a match or four in order to get Ollie Pope back into the middle order along with Jonny Bairstow, Jos Buttler and Moeen.
In truth, England have so much to consider that predicting the top seven is rather like betting on the Grand National, and Kohli must be rather pleased that after just five days’ cricket, he already has his opponents calling for reinforcements and drawing up new battle plans.
India set for fun in the sun
While England made use of pretty awful overhead conditions when beating India at Lord’s in 2018, the 2014 meeting between the two sides was a fine Test match with India coming out on top after Ajinkja Rahane had rescued his side with a first-innings hundred on a day-one pitch that was very green but soon flattened out into a good surface.
That is Lord’s in a nutshell, and though the first couple of hours can be a significant test for top-order batsmen, it is generally a good pitch that offers something for everyone and stays true throughout.
As such, I don’t think there is a massive toss bias and I'm happy to back INDIA at 7/5 to underline their superiority and draw first blood in a series that already appears to have swung in the their favour.
In the belief that India will be hard to stop from here, the SERIES CORRECT SCORE market makes for interesting reading and backing the tourists to win the series 3-1 at 7/1 appeals to some degree. I’d rather have a couple of bites of the cherry, though, so instead, I’ll take INDIA 3-0 AND 4-0 at 14/1 and 18/1 respectively with the former offering some cover if the weather intervenes again.
All in on India then? It seems so and with that in mind, I can’t resist having a couple running for me in the MAN OF THE MATCH market at Lord’s.
First up is the aforementioned RAVINDRA JADEJA who is proving to be something of a thorn in England’s side and now averages 33.41 with the bat against the Three Lions.
He played really well again at Trent Bridge and while he wasn’t required to bowl much there, I suspect he will be at Lord’s as the match goes on and spin comes into the equation. All action and seemingly always in the game, I expect Jadeja to show up well again and just as Chris Woakes picked up the Man of the Match gong with his exploits from number seven at this very ground three years ago, another talented all-rounder can do the same this week.
Secondly, I want ROHIT SHARMA on side for all I accept he could be in for tough work early on if India bat first. Despite facing an on-song Anderson last week, Rohit rarely looked flustered for his 36 and 12 not out, and just as he demonstrated when plundering 345 runs at 57.50 against this same opposition in the winter, once set, he tends to go big. Lord’s is a great place to bat once you are in and Rohit could take some stopping if England don’t get him early.
Impressive Robinson worth betting at Lord's
Splitting stakes on Jadeja at 20/1 and Rohit at 12/1 will do for me, while OLLIE ROBINSON won’t go unbacked following another strong showing in Nottingham. Robinson has now been England’s leading first-innings wicket-taker in both of his Tests to date, his five-wicket haul last week backing up his four wickets (seven in the match) against New Zealand on debut at this same ground in June.
As I’ve said many times before in these pages, Robinson was always likely to take Test cricket by storm and it was significant that Root preferred him to Stuart Broad at key times last week.
I actually still thought James Anderson’s was the best of England’s bowlers in that match, but Robinson has that priceless knack of picking up wickets and it is worth noting that he got through more overs there than any other England bowler. Root, as if he doesn’t have enough on his plate, will know the importance of minding Anderson – his most prized asset after Stokes – with so much cricket ahead, and that might mean his spearhead is kept for the really crucial moments.
The younger Robinson, on the other hand, could find himself getting more overs than his colleagues, particularly at the lower order, and that makes him a more attractive betting proposition.
I wouldn’t discount Moeen were we betting on the second innings, given how well he bowled against India in 2018, but the seamers should do the bulk of the damage in the first innings and Robinson is worth a bet at 3/1.
Published at 1410 BST on 10/08/21
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