England v India – live! | Alan Gardner and Tom Lutz

• Hit the auto-update button or refresh for the latest posts • Send your thoughts to alan.gardner.casual@guardian.co.uk • View the full scoreboard from The Oval here 36th over: India 109-5 (Dravid 60, Dhoni 6) Broad beats Dhoni with a devil of a delivery (perhaps a devilry?), the batsman pushing forward outside off uncertainly. That’s just the line for Broad. “Morning Gardner, morning everybody. I’ve got tickets for tomorrow, so the most pressing question is how substantial a picnic to take. Can your reader(s) offer any suggestions?” According to our esteemed bookmaker friends, England are 3-1 to win today, Josh Robinson. So maybe you should consider breakfast and little more? 35th over: India 108-5 (Dravid 59, Dhoni 6) It’ll be Graeme Swann at the other end, naturelment. Dhoni goes after the spinner’s first ball, sweeping hard but missing, pad rather than bat coming into the equation. Swann appeals but the result is a leg bye to Dhoni. That, though, is a huge shout, again for lbw against Dhoni. The India captain stepped outside the line of off and lifted his arms above his head, offering no shot whatsoever. The ball would have had to have come back a fair way, and Simon Taufel decides it wouldn’t have done enough … only for Hawk-Eye to adjudge that it would have clipped the top of off. As Bumble says, though, it would have been a guess to give that out. 34th over: India 104-5 (Dravid 57, Dhoni 5) Hey ho, away we go, with Stuart Broad to bowl the first over of the morning. He starts with a no-ball. Try again, Stuey. His next delivery takes the outside edge of the bat but the ball stays low, bobbling its way to Anderson in the slips. Broad’s line for the rest of the over is largely angled into Dravid, trying to unpick that immaculate defense, before the final ball, an away swinger, is left by the batsman. “While the recurring finals anxiety dream is, indeed, a nightmare, waking to discover that you never have to take another exam is truly a fabulous moment of recompense,” notes Steve Busfield, our man Stateside. True, it’s a huge wave of relief that washes over you. Hang on, what time is it in New York? Have you just woken up from that very dream, Steve, and come to comfort yourself with a soothing session of the cricket? The England team are out on the pitch , and the crowd greet them with warm applause. The sun is struggling to break through low cloud cover, from the looks of it, and there’s the suggestion we might get a spot of rain at some point during the morning. Not that such inconvenience would throw England off the scent, you feel. The first email of the day and it’s a doozy: “Dear Sir,” begins Vladimir Harkonnen – a phrase to chill any OBOer’s heart. “I wish to protest against the careless use of the word whitewash which has crept into our latter-day demotic tongue. Especially as applied to England’s annihilation of India, the term is inadequate. A better way of expressing it would be to say that England have Rochestered India. See: John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester, finest poem The Annihilation of Nothing. I trust you will correct your phraseology forthwith.” Didn’t Rochester write a lot of blue poetry? In which case, we might just as well say that England have Rogered India. But then, this is a family show, so we’ll stick with whitewash, until the guardian style guide dictates otherwise. Less chat, more hat: The bid for the sun hat signed by England’s three hundred-makers at Brisbane last winter currently stands at a round £300. Not bad you might say – but with all proceeds from the auction going to the Mines Advisory Group , it would be remiss not to aim higher. Email your price to the OBO and the highest bidder at the end of the series gets the prize. Preamble: You know those anxiety dreams you get? Like when you stand up to give that deal-sealing presentation and realise that you’ve forgotten to put your trousers on. Again. Or when you go for a job interview but can’t even spell CV, let alone describe what’s on yours. Followers of the England cricket team used to be well acquainted with the cold sweats. Even until recently, a night’s slumber could be suddenly, heart-thumpingly disturbed by the mental echo of a Chennai 2008 or a 51 all out. Men and women with stronger constitutions than I have woken in the middle of the night screaming the name of the south Australian ground out loud. Not any more. This England team gives the opposition nightmares and it would be no surprise to hear that even the Little Master has been going to bed with his bat for the last few weeks, to ward off the nocturnal spectre of Jimmy and his swingers. Andrew Strauss’s side may be 3-0 up in the series but, at The Oval, there’s been no rest for the wicket. In 33 intense overs yesterday evening, the bowlers ripped into India’s flagging line-up once again and, weather permitting, England have an excellent opportunity to wrap up a second consecutive victory by an innings. The last time India lost by such a margin twice in the same series was in 1983, at the hands of West Indies. So, English cricket is no longer responsible for your fret dreams. That doesn’t mean they don’t still occur from time to time, though, does it? And not just because of the cheese . I still sometimes wake to discover, thankfully, that my university finals took place several years ago and it doesn’t matter if I haven’t read any of the books. But enough about me – what’s your story? India in England 2011 England cricket team India cricket team Cricket Over by over reports Alan Gardner guardian.co.uk

Posted by on August 21, 2011. Filed under News, Politics, World News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.