adminBIRMINGHAM. – England captain Ben Stokes on BBC Test Match Special: “It is amazing. I haven’t really got much for you to be honest!
“The change, you know, you’re talking about mindset and everything like that, but when you’ve got real clarity in what you want to achieve as a team and how you want to play it makes things a lot easier. We know what we were going to do – we knew we were always going to go out and try and chase that down from the get go. A great way to explain is that teams are perhaps better than us, but teams won’t be braver than us. Jack Leach said that to me about two minutes ago and it is a great way to sum things up at the moment.”
Man of the match Jonny Bairstow on BBC Test Match Special: “It is great. Every time I get to speak to you it is normally a good thing so long may it continue. Rooty obviously got this reward, it’s extremely special how he’s playing and for so long. It is awesome, it is a great environment at the moment. It is fantastic the way we’re playing and everyone is really enjoying the success and that is a huge part of it.
“If Joe and I are out there doing it together we’re in a really good place. We’ve been doing it for a long time together now.
“It is really special to knock off 378 with just three down. It is something that we’ll never forget. After day two I got asked what do you think is too many and I said ‘whatever they set we’ll go for’ and that’s exactly what we did. The opening partnership deserves a huge amount of credit, for the way they went about it and the brand of cricket that we’re trying to play, it was epitomised by that opening stand. It isn’t going to work every time but the pressure and intensity which they put on world-class bowling takes a huge amount of guts, courage and skill.”
Phil Tufnell, Former England spinner on BBC Test Match Special
“It’s sublime batting. It’s just relentless ticking over of the strike and gorgeous striking for four. It is something to behold. It’s great to see. Joe Root made batting look like a routine job. Not a care in the world, just went about his business and never looked like getting out.
“I’m just trying to take it all in. I think if England were set 550, they would have still knocked it all off. India had no ideas.” – BBC Sport.
Online Reporter