Thursday’s first day marked the first time in this Test series that an equal contest between bat and ball ensued. The theme was unaltered at Lord’s on Friday, England and India trading measured punches like two well-matched heavyweights looking for openings to exploit rather than banking on raw power and bravado to get the job done. At the time of going to press, India were 119-3 Jasprit Bumrah led the nip-and-tuck charge with a brilliant three-wicket burst in the morning once Joe Root had kept his tryst with a 37th century, until England repelled it with a wonderful eighth-wicket association between the irrepressible Jamie Smith and the enterprising Brydon Carse. India would have gladly settled for a final English tally of 387, given that the hosts resumed on 251-4 with Root and Ben Stokes firmly entrenched in the middle. But in the end, that might have looked a few runs too many after Bumrah’s brilliance left the hosts reeling at 271-7 within 20 minutes of the start.

Bumrah’s quest for second first-innings five-for this series received an early shot in the arm when he snuck the ball through Stokes’s gate in the third over the day, this after Root had drive the first ball of the day, from the same bowler, in the air wide of gully for his 10th four that took him to his eighth Lord’s hundred. Bumrah then dismissed Root and Chris Woakes off successive deliveries before the Smith-Carse fightback, which yielded 84 priceless runs.

England’s Joe Root celebrates his century yesterday. PIC/BIPIN PATEL