Sublime Duckett leads way for historic England win

After five days of toil and a fair bit of angst about the call to bowl first, England emerged victorious, reeling in a target of 371 runs in the final hour of the match to beat India by five wickets.

- Ali Martin

Headingley had another entry into its annals of absurdity, as had this remarkably spirited England team led by Ben Stokes.

There were a few nerves and setbacks on an epic final day, moments when this new-look India team summoned up the tamasha and squeezed. But at 6.28pm, as Jamie Smith launched Ravindra Jadeja into the stands, a chase underpinned by Ben Duckett's sublime 149 was wrapped up to claim a 1-0 lead.

Among the biggest surprises was that Jasprit Bumrah went wicketless in the fourth innings as England - and a pitch that held firm to the end - successfully repelled India's champion bowler. Smith applied the coup de grace to finish on 44 not out, while the ever-unflappable Joe Root was out there with him on a classy 53.

But this seismic chase - the second-highest in England's history after knocking off 378 against India at Edgbaston three years ago - was broken open by an assertive 188-run opening stand between Duckett and Zak Crawley, 65. For Shubman Gill, in his first Test as India captain, every boundary they slotted was a gut punch.

This match was also history, but not the kind Gill would have wanted. His side became the first to register five centuries in a Test and go on to lose, with Don Bradman's Australia, in 1928, the only team to do so after four. Central to this were lower order collapses of seven for 41 and six for 31 - both induced by Josh Tongue - as well as a number of dropped catches.