India v England: Day four verdict - Sehwag's brilliance shows England how to play

England Cricket / Ed Hawkins / 14 December 2008 /

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Plodding play costs England and India now stand on the brink of landmark comeback win. Ed Hawkins on the fourth day in Chennai...

Know-how, wisdom, the smarts. Call it what you will but one thing is certain is that Kevin Pietersen either lost his, or never had any in the first place as England allowed India to roar back into contention for the first Test in Chennai when they should have been whimpering in the dressing-rooms.

Virender Sehwag played a brilliant counter-attacking 83 from 68 balls as India's price collapsed from the 20s into as short as [2.20] as an improbable target of 387 - and one which has only been bettered three times in Test history - was set about with gusto.

As luminous as Sehwag's innings was there can be no doubt that it was triggered by England's negativity when crawling to a declaration just after tea.

India left the field to prepare for their innings buoyant when they should have been anything but. They believed they could win because Pietersen had inadvertently signalled that he didn't trust his bowlers to win for him.

It could be a bad error in the context of this game and is damning indictment, although an early one, on what sort of captain Pietersen is going to make.

His assertion that he is going to be an attacking leader looks hollow in the wake of the day four action. It is often said that teams play in the image of the man that leads them. And although it would be hard to imagine Pietersen batting as slowly as Andrew Strauss, who became the tenth Englishman to hit two centuries in a Test, Paul Collingwood and Matt Prior did, make no mistake they were doing so under his instruction.

In the afternoon session England hit only two boundaries, as they laboured to just 57 runs in 22.5 overs at exactly the time when they should have been scoring fast runs to propel them to the 400 target they obviously wanted to set. For the first time in the Test they had dropped the baton and Sehwag picked it up.

Whether England go on to grab it again in this Test - they are [2.8] with India [2.74] and the draw is [3.50] - remains to be seen but what we can be sure of is that under Pietersen it may slip through their fingers more often than not.

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