The Oval, Sunday night – So, it all comes down to 35 runs or four wickets, and, inevitably, a look at the sky.
England are a handful of blows away from lifting the Anderson-Tendulkar Trophy, India are four strikes from 3-1, and the forecast is somewhere in between. The Met Office reckons Monday will be mostly cloudy, breezy, with “one or two showers” drifting in after lunch. BBC Weather adds a chance of a light one around 1 pm. Get on by 11 am and, frankly, the match shouldn’t stretch very far unless those showers linger.
“It’s an amazing spectacle to look forward to,” said Joe Root after bad light and then rain forced the players off at 5.30 pm on day four. Stumps were called at 6.01 pm once the rain set in, which felt about right on a Test that has already lost time on three of the four days.
Root added that Chris Woakes is “ready if he’s needed [to bat]”, even though the all-rounder’s right arm remains strapped in a sling and the dressing-room talk is of a dislocated shoulder. Whether Woakes is required – perhaps one-handed – depends on India’s ability to wink out the last recognised batter and then run through the tail.
As ever, the surface hasn’t misbehaved. When the rain stayed away it played true, which is why the final equation looks so straightforward. Yet no one in either camp feels entirely settled. India’s bowling coach, Paras Mhambrey, quietly noted the “little bit of nip” still on offer every time the clouds gather. England, meanwhile, keep glancing at the radar more than the scoreboard.
One thing is clear: it will take sustained, proper rain – not the odd shower – to deny a result. Both teams, for different reasons, believe they only need an hour. The forecast promises more than that, but in an English August you take nothing for granted – especially when a Test series is on the line.
