Ben Stokes has deep pockets, so deep they can fit a veteran and an ingenue with room to spare. From one end at Visakhapatnam ran in a finely honed, well oiled machine, slim as a sapling, neat as a pocket handkerchief, mahogany from years fielding in the sun. On his head another tonsorial reinvention, this time a nod to the bottles of Sun In hair lightener beloved by teenage girls in the 1980s, but on the pitch the same relentlessly skilful probing on off-stump honed over 183 Tests.
This was Jimmy Anderson’s first international since the final Ashes Test at the Oval in July last year. It was a disheartening series for Anderson, who played in four of the five Tests but took only five wickets at 85.40 and seemed to have lost his knack for coaxing the ball this way and that. There were even whispers of retirement. But he ignored them and here he is again in England whites, rhythm restored, at 41 years and 187 days the oldest pace bowler to appear in a Test. His day’s work was 17 miserly overs for 30 runs, including a working over of Shubman Gill before tempting him into a tickle behind, collected by a diving Ben Foakes. It was the fifth time Gill has been dismissed by Anderson in his fledgling 21-Test career.
Slither down the slide rule, a decade, two, and another slight figure, Shoaib Bashir, was making his Test debut. Bashir is just 20, with only six first-class games and 10 first-class wickets under his belt. As tall as the office blocks sprouting all over his home town of Woking, he has fingers that curve over and around a cricket ball, shrinking it to dried cranberry proportions. Shirt loose in the Bazball way, he reacted to Stokes throwing him the ball in the 12th over with astonishing calm, after England lost the toss on a flat wicket.
All easy action, he rattled through a first accurate over, conceding only a single, and 2.3 overs later had his first Test wicket, when Rohit Sharma angled his bat and the ball plopped into Ollie Pope’s hands at leg slip, with Bashir watching its arc the whole way. Bashir pumped his long arms in glee before being smothered by his loving new teammates.
His release point, like Tom Hartley’s, is 25cm higher than the global average release point for spinners – which is a complicated way of saying that this England like their spinners tall. It is also one of the things that caught the eye of Steve Davies when he spotted Bashir playing for Berkshire against Somerset’s under-18s in 2022. Davies had a word with the Somerset director of cricket, Andy Hurry, who quickly got Bashir to sign on the dotted line after just one game for the Somerset second XI. Surrey, who let him go as a 17-year-old, may now be glancing wistfully behind.
Vic Marks, another Somerset off-spinner to play Tests in India, was watching from home with admiration: “I was incredibly impressed. I just think it is amazing how composed he looks, he shares with Dom Bess that kind of nerveless confidence, that feeling of, OK, I’ll give it a go. I’ve heard only great things about him at Somerset and he seems to effortlessly fit in. I also think it is rather wonderful how this England regime is making these young guys feel so comfortable.
“My one old pro feeling is that he almost tries to do too much, he has too much variety. He has massive variations in pace, his first ball was 97kph but he also bowled the odd one at 79. In T20 you have to mix it up like fury, but in Test cricket I have this notion that the longer the game the more you have to keep bowling your best ball.”
Bashir finished the day having rolled through 28 overs, 10 more than anyone else, and with a real tweak in his fingers. As well as Sharma, he collected the wicket of Axar Patel, who rocked wildly back and swung him to point with just half an hour to go until stumps.
He took the odd bashing from the outrageously talented Yashasvi Jaiswal, just two years his senior and five matches more advanced in his Test career – though Bashir nearly nabbed him when he took a wild swipe on 162. But, on his Test debut, to share the bowling plaudits with Anderson, despite all the background noise regarding his visa, made it a day to treasure.
