London: India captain Shubman Gill said Rishabh Pant’s run-out in the first innings was the moment which pushed his team back in the third Test. “We felt that Rishabh getting run-out in the first innings was the turning point. The way they were batting, we thought we could have taken a 50–100 run lead in the first innings. We knew the pitch was going to get tougher to bat on in the last innings,” Gill said after the match. Pant was run-out while trying to give the strike to KL Rahul on the stroke of lunch on the third day. Rahul later conceded that the duo had had a chat two overs earlier about trying to reach his hundred before lunch. Rahul had hit a long hop from Shoaib Bashir straight to deep point for a single, following which Pant tried to steal a single to put Rahul back on strike. Ben Stokes, however, effected a superb run-out at the bowler’s end to wreck the duo’s plans.
Gill said there had been discussions in the dressing room about personal milestones being secondary. However, he came out in defence of Rahul on Monday evening. “We do have those discussions. The team’s cause is always important. I think Pant called for the run and it was Rahul who was going to the danger end. So, I believe it was more of an error in judgment,” Gill said.
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While lamenting the top-order’s failure on the final day, Gill mentioned that the team started believing once Ravindra Jadeja and Jasprit Bumrah got going in the second session. “The top order unfortunately didn’t perform. It is the first time in the series that it happened. But it’s a very proud team effort,” Gill said. “When Bumrah and Jaddu bhai were batting, every five or six runs that we were scoring, we could see England were starting to feel the pressure. That’s all we needed. A small partnership of 30, 40 runs could make such a huge difference. And we were quite optimistic when Siraj was batting. We thought if there were 12–15 runs to chase with the second new ball, a couple of boundaries here and there could have taken us there.” Gill also dispelled doubts over Pant’s left index finger injury which prevented him from keeping wickets in the Test. “Pant went for scans. Nothing major has come out of it. He should be fine for the Manchester Test,” Gill said.
