Sharp U-Turn! England Now Happy To Draw 2nd Test Vs India: 'We Are Not Stupid'

Sharp U-Turn! England Now Happy To Draw 2nd Test Vs India: 'We Are Not Stupid'

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News18.com

Last Updated: July 06, 2025, 07:36 IST

Only hours after Harry Brook claimed that England will aim to chase whatever target India set at Edgbaston, their assistant coach has accepted draw as a good result for Day 5.

Will Ben Stokes accept a second draw of his Test captaincy career? (Picture Credit: AP)

India’s dominating display on Day 4 of the Edgbaston Test has overturned the rhetoric in the England dressing room, with assistant coach Marcus Trescothick admitting that a draw would be a good result for the hosts on Sunday (July 6). His comments were in sharp contrast to vice-captain Harry Brook claiming just 24 hours previously that ‘everybody in the world knew’ that they would chase whatever target India would set for them.

The visitors played their hand well and kept on batting — Shubman Gill hit another 150 to lead from the front — until they reached a target which required a miracle to be chased, 608. Pacers Akash Deep and Mohammed Siraj then bowled inch-perfectly in the final hour, taking the wickets of both openers and the best batter, Joe Root. England went to Stumps at 72/3, 536 runs behind the target.

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“We are always trying to be as positive as we can," Trescothick said in the press conference when asked about the fans’ belief in the stadium, as quoted by ESPNcricinfo. “We all probably appreciate that it’s a hell of a lot of runs to try and score. It’s 550 [536] tomorrow and I don’t think we’ve seen scoring rates quite that quick in a day, so of course it will be challenging. But we’ve probably about another 10 to 15 overs of the balls at the hardest point before it gets a little bit soft, and then we’ll see how we’re going from that point, really."

When asked about whether England will now accept draw as a good result, Trescothick said they were ‘not stupid’ to blindly chase a result.

“Whenever the situation is changing, of course it is. When you get to the point that you can [only] draw the game, of course. We’re not stupid enough to [think] that you have to just win or lose. There are three results possible in every game that you play. But we have done some things in our time that are different to what we’ve done before."

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Despite Brook’s comments being one of many examples of England looking down at draws (in the Ben Stokes era, they have only drawn one Test, a rain-washed Ashes game in 2023), Trescothick labeled the hubris as just media perception.

“This has kind of built up away from probably what the changing room messages are," he said. “You guys have a perception of what you think goes on in the changing room, and we obviously understand it a little bit more [than] the perception of what we’re trying to do. We’re trying to give the players the best opportunity to win games every time that we go out to play, and then if we can’t do that, then we try and adapt accordingly, and plan ahead to what we’re going to try and do," he added.

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First Published: July 06, 2025, 07:36 IST

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