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With his bowlers finding it tough to dismiss Virat Kohli and Cheteshwar Pujara, Alastair Cook resorted to the same policy that his Indian counterpart deployed against Ben Stokes on the first day which was bowling outside the channel packing the off-side. As a result, the duo left a lot of deliveries. The ploy seemed to work as Pujara played an uncharacteristic shot to get out. The pressure also resulted in a middle-order collapse as from 148 for 2, the hosts were reduced to 156 for 5.

Meanwhile, Pujara denied the suggestions that they struggled against the English bowlers and went on to accuse them of bowling a negative line.

Speaking to the media after the day’s play, he said:“I think we did not struggle but the lines that they (England) were bowling were a little negative. But I still feel the way we batted, we showed character. We were leaving the balls outside the off-stump and we built a partnership, which was crucial for the team.

“The second session was good for us. I won’t say they had an advantage as I mentioned earlier that lines that they bowled were slightly negative,” he added.

Defending the hosts’ cautious approach, he said:“See, everyone has a gameplan. I don’t think there is anything wrong with the way we batted, we stuck to our plans. Obviously, in the last session, we lost many wickets, which we didn’t want to but things happen.

“But as I said, we recovered well from that. We have been leaving balls well, not particularly only in this Test match, in the past also we have left balls well outside the off-stump as batsmen have a clear gameplan.”

England were looking set to take a first innings lead when they dismissed Kohli with the scoreboard reading 204 but an unbeaten partnership of 67 runs between R Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja helped India to finish the day on 271 or 6, 12 runs behind England’s total. Praising the duo for their brilliant batting, Pujara said:“I think we have an advantage that both our all-rounders are playing. Probably the first session will be crucial for us. Our gameplan will be really simple. Looking to (first) get a lead of around 75-100 runs and then continue batting.

“Both (Jadeja and Ashwin) of them can bat. As we saw in the last game that Jayant Yadav can also bat. So our lower order has been contributing in all Test matches and we expect them to contribute tomorrow as well.”

Pujara was looking well-set to get another big score after reaching his fifty. However, trying to clear the boundary, he could only balloon the ball which was caught brilliantly by Chris Woakes. Expressing his disappointment over his shot, he said:“I was disappointed in the way I got out. There was a ball probably I could have hit for four, but I didn’t time it well.”

He also heaped praise on Parthiv Patel who was playing a Test match after 8 years and scored 42 runs.

Pujara said:“Parthiv has been a good batsman and the kind of runs he has scored in first-class cricket, it could be seen in his confidence in this game. Another thing is that he has the experience of playing a lot of first-class cricket and he has played Test cricket at the age of 17, so probably he has matured now, kind of form he is in, he will continue batting well in the second innings.”