Joe Root : Good footwork made it difficult for Indian spinners

11/10/2016

Joe Root expressed his delight at batting freely alongside southpaw Moeen Ali after their partnership of 179 put England in a strong position on the opening day of the first Test against India in Rajkot. Root also admitted that the decision to review the dismissal of opener Haseeb Hameed was his.

"I am just trying to be positive with my footwork. Get right forward, get right back with my feet at times and when it was available, use the sweep shot. Make it hard for them to settle into one line and length," Root told reporters after notching up his first-ever hundred in Asia and the third against India.

"It wasn't a specific approach. More than anything, as soon as anyone lets go out of the ball, you just got to play what's coming at you. We tried to make sure we used both sides of the wicket. Not just score with the spin, but try and do against it if the opportunities arose. Make it hard for (Ashwin) him to bowl one length,” he explained.

The 25-year-old’s century, combined with Ali's unbeaten 99, made life difficult for the Indian bowlers as England cruised to 311 for four at stumps. Root pointed out that the right-left batting combination did not allow the Indian bowlers to build pressure.

"And batting with Moeen, who was also batting very freely and kept it ticking over, and as a left-hander, it was just difficult for them to build any sort of pressure. It is going to be really important for us to build on that as a team. And if we manage to do that it is going to be quite difficult for them to build that pressure in the first innings.

"It might be different in the second innings when the ball starts to spin more and variable bounce coming in as well. But if we can start well in the first innings to make those big scores, then should give us a great opportunity when it comes to bowling as well," he reckoned.

Root also hoped that the other England batsmen could continue to build on the foundation laid by him.

"Yeah, it's a nice start to this series. Something to build on now and it was a great day of cricket for us. Hopefully tomorrow Moeen and Stokesy (Ben Stokes) can go on and make a really big score, big partnership and take us into a really good position going into the second innings."

Root felt that his decision to use the DRS for the lbw decision against debutant Hameed was a wrong call.

"Yeah, that (use of DRS after Hameed was declared out lbw) was my fault. We didn't quite get it right today - the referrals - and I've sort of made it a habit to get them wrong, hopefully I can change it through the rest of the series."

Joe Root : Good footwork made it difficult for Indian spinners

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