Galloping Dravid Helps India Join the Chase

The ticker tape and garlands may have been put away for another day in Bombay, Delhi and Calcutta, but in the watery evening sunlight at the Oval yesterday Rahul Dravid gave notice to England that India are some way from conceding the final Test.

Faced with another formidable first-innings total, this time 515, India lost the early wicket of Virender Sehwag to the new ball, Andy Caddick and a sharp catch by Dominic Cork, the latest England player to take up residence at second slip.

Dravid is in the form of his life, though, and in the final 76 minutes of an industrious day all round he booked himself in again, caressing six fours in an unbeaten 31 as India closed on 66 for one, still 250 runs shy of avoiding the follow-on.

As with Michael Vaughan, at present there is an inevitability about Dravid, based on a technique that allows him to see the ball early and then wait and wait yet longer before playing it. So far this series he has hit 416 runs at an average approaching 70, with hundreds at Trent Bridge and at Headingley, where he was man of the match and instrumental in hauling India back into the series.

It is early days still for his second-wicket partnership with Sanjay Bangar, so far worth 48, but the all-rounder, whose diligence against the new ball at Headingley helped lay the foundations for India's massive total, is again proving the equivalent of a stone to blunt English scissors.

England's attack, criticised in the previous two Tests, gave the batsmen rather more to think about yesterday, through the simple expedient of bowling straight and, if Caddick's first over gave Sehwag a flier with eight runs, then it brought him the wicket when he pitched one a bit wider and the batsman chased it.

Keen to make a further breakthrough, Nasser Hussain rang the changes like campanologists sounding their Steadmans across the Fens. A full peal of eight bells calls for 40,320 changes, so seven in 22 overs represented a good start. It allows neither batsmen nor bowlers to settle, however, and today, with the pitch still playing into the hands of the batsmen, there will be some hard work.

For most of the day it had not been good watching. Just as judging an Ann Widdecombe lookalike contest would be by no means a pretty exercise, so with England's batting yesterday after Vaughan's silky skills on the first day. But this was functional, a question of needs must, with the primary object of putting the match beyond the scope of India's winning, while giving England a total with which they could apply pressure.

In recent years such scores would have been considered stratospherical. Achieve them consistently, and at a pace to give bowlers time, and, as the Australians have been showing for years, games become easier to win. This season, though, admittedly on some belting pitches, England have reached or surpassed 487 in six out of eight completed innings and their improvement overall is no coincidence.

Having missed out on a double century in the second Test at Trent Bridge, Vaughan began the second day with an unmissable opportunity to rectify the situation. His 182 on Thursday was sublime and he continued in the same vein, hitting Ajit Agarkar's second ball of the day through extra cover and then angling another boundary to third man before the over was out. He had reached 195 when he prodded out at a ball from Zaheer Khan that was slanted across his bows and sent an edge to Ajay Ratra behind the stumps.

Having added only 13 runs Vaughan's disappointment was evident but he acknowledged the generous applause of another full house before hauling himself up the steps. Twice out in the 190s smacks of carelessness but such is the level of his technical skill, temperament and attitude that a really huge innings is well within his compass. In all he batted for just over six hours and hit 29 fours, his third-wicket partnership with John Crawley worth 77.

Both Crawley and Hussain soon departed, lending respectability to the figures of Bangar who used a damp morning to find movement away from the bat and bowled with more purpose as a result.

At 372 for five, and a lengthy tail to fol low, England were in danger of wasting a healthy position. But Alec Stewart, missed at slip when four, played quietly for his 23 to add 62 with Cork who, after being dropped by Sourav Ganguly at midwicket as he flicked Harbhajan Singh to the onside, marked his promotion up the order with 52, the third half-century in 37 Tests to date, before a full toss had him lbw.

Later Ashley Giles played to good effect for 31 before Harbhajan terminated the innings to finish with five for 115, his ninth five-for or better in 28 Tests.