James Lawton: England show their ruthless side in rising to the Test again

Part by part, instinct by instinct, under superior leadership England have put together a team that has the spirit and the competitive intestines to face down opposition

(Reuters)

When MS Dhoni, at 30 the not so old streetfighter, went at 4.19 yesterday afternoon you knew that the will, and maybe the heart, of Indian cricket had been broken – at least for the next three days.

You also knew what it meant to English cricket – the relatively new, tough-minded, abrasive-as-you-want-it-to-be England who can begin to imagine how it might be to look down on the rest of the game.

England did more than scent blood as Dhoni went back to the pavilion.

They began to measure themselves as potentially the most formidable team in the form of the game which, over the last few days here, has made all imitations look so slight and so shoddy.

You might say that Dhoni's fall was not so significant because the great ageing men, Rahul Dravid, V V S Laxman and the Little Master himself, Sachin Tendulkar, had all gone before him. But if they are cricketers for the ages, it is Dhoni who best represents the hard edge of today's big-money game.

This meant that when the captain, who in the recent World Cup final promoted himself in the batting order to utterly decisive effect, surrendered to Chris Tremlett with an airy prod of his bat that edged the ball into the gloves of wicketkeeper Matt Prior, England knew that they were halfway to becoming the best Test team in the world.

Dhoni left India at 225 for 6 with only Suresh Raina a viable candidate to hold together a suddenly besieged tail and, gamely though the rotund little man from Uttar Pradesh fought, there was never much doubt that England would have that No 1 ranking within touching distance when the second Test starts at Trent Bridge on Friday.

Dhoni's departure was the moment when People's Monday here at the headquarters of cricket turned into the celebration of another major stride by the team moulded out of almost comic failure by coach Andy Flower and captain Andrew Strauss.

Earlier this year they fashioned the crushing defence of the Ashes Down Under – a major achievement for a team which had all the appearances of being splintered and dismayed when the captaincy of Kevin Pietersen unravelled so quickly.

Part by part, instinct by instinct, under this superior leadership England have put together a team that might not yet have touched all the natural skills and composure of the men who put India at the pinnacle of the game, but are producing a growing body of evidence that they have the spirit – and the competitive intestines – to face down even the most impressively programmed opposition.

India, let's be very sure about this, were a parody of such a force in the first Test. Their attack was reduced to a farcical level when the main strike bowler Zaheer Khan appeared here plainly unfit and promptly broke down on the first day. Praveen Kumar and Ishant Sharma – especially the latter – provided bursts of impressive quality, but with Tendulkar hit by a virus and Dhoni on two occasions forced to abandon the wicketkeeper's gloves for stints as a barely adequate fourth bowler, England had every incentive to display their muscular ambition.

In the end they did this with a growing authority – and a fine, needling edge.

Stuart Broad seemed likely to have booked another audience with a match referee with his outrage at the umpire Billy Bowden's denial of his claims for the wicket of Raina – an lbw decision which would've been an absolute formality under the Decision Review System so outrageously rejected by India for this series. But if Broad mimed disbelief and horror about as well as anyone since Charlie Chaplin, he remembered that he still had the job of breaking down the last of the Indian resistance.

Under the leadership of a magnificently committed – and brooding – Jimmy Anderson, Broad completed a near Lazarus-style resurrection when adding the wickets of tail-enders Kumar and Sharma to his Sunday night ambush of opener Abhinav Mukund. This augmented some superb first-innings work and a vital batting contribution on Sunday.

However, it was Anderson who claimed his third visit to the Lord's honours board with his haul of five wickets – and what scalps they were. He knocked down the fabulous triumvirate of Tendulkar, Laxman and Dravid, who produced the one piece of true Indian batting distinction on the third day with a century of peerless concentration and touch, and also top scorer Raina.

There were times when Anderson, scowling his contempt at anyone in his path, and especially Dhoni, became the cantankerous driving force of the English ambition. Between them Anderson and Broad took us a long way into the tough nature of this England team. It is one which does not spill over with grace notes, but has become impressively committed to the job in hand.

Down Under, England simply rolled over Australia, at times cruelly exploiting the obvious decline in the strength of those in the baggy green caps. Here this summer there is still plenty of work to do on project India.

Three days may not represent too much of a respite, certainly not from a defeat by 196 runs, but we can be sure that India will appear at Trent Bridge in much more respectable battle order.

They will, for a start, have at least four fully functioning bowlers and we can be sure, too, that Tendulkar and Laxman will be anxious to achieve the quality and concentration produced by Dravid in the one sustained example of the kind of performance which first confirmed India's world status as cricket's top team.

No, India are not yet beaten – and certainly not by the necessary margin of the two clear wins that would take England to the top of the rankings. However, there is no doubt they are under the gravest pressure. They have been put there by a team which has learnt both to prepare and to fight like true professionals. Now they can taste their rewards. It makes them a little nasty at times, but never out of sight of the point of what they are doing. India, for the moment at least, can only yearn to make such a statement.