Published by Global Banking & Finance Review®
Posted on July 24, 2025
1 min readLast updated: January 22, 2026
Crawley and Duckett's partnership leads England's recovery against India, closing day two at 225-2 after Pant's heroics.
By Peter Hall
MANCHESTER, England (Reuters) -A superb 166-run opening partnership between Zak Crawley and Ben Duckett lead England's recovery on day two of the fourth test against India, the hosts 225-2 at the close of play on Thursday, trailing the tourists by 133 runs.
A gutsy half century from the injured Rishabh Pant helped India post 358 in their first innings, with England captain Ben Stokes' first five-wicket test haul in eight years helping see off the tourists' tail.
Crawley and Duckett moved at a rapid rate before tea to eat into India's total as England's reply got under way, but neither could convert their impressive starts into centuries, the pair falling for 84 and 94 respectively in the evening session.
Joe Root and Ollie Pope survived several close calls to see England through to the close, putting the hosts in with a chance of sealing victory in the five-match series with one test to spare.
(Reporting by Peter Hall, Editing by Ed Osmond, Andrew Cawthorne and Pritha Sarkar)
Zak Crawley and Ben Duckett formed a superb 166-run opening partnership.
Rishabh Pant scored a gutsy half-century, helping India post 358 in their first innings.
Ben Stokes recorded his first five-wicket test haul in eight years.
England ended the day at 225-2, putting them in a strong position to seal victory in the series.
No, neither Crawley nor Duckett could convert their impressive starts into centuries.
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