England, on the other hand, will aim to bat through the day. If they bat the whole of Friday, they will get somewhere between 450-500 which will lend a handy lead in excess of 100. Neither of Ollie Pope or Joe Root looked confident in each's short stay at the crease on Thursday but every day is a new day. The first hour, as always, will be very crucial. If India manage to bowl the hosts out in a couple of sessions, this will become another one-inning shootout. And that will mean, that the hosts will have to bat last on a tricky pitch. In the 6 sessions so far, both teams have won 3 apiece. India won the opening day while England fought back to take the second. Who will take the honours on Day 3 and move the game forward decisively? The first ball will be bowled on Friday, 25th July, 2025, at 3.30 pm IST (1000 GMT) but our buildup will begin well in advance. Also, the weather could be key as well. Join us early then, for all the updates. ADIOS! TAKE CARE!

At the start of Day 2, KL Rahul had mentioned that this is probably the best pitch of the series for batters. Looking at the way England have batted so far, it is very hard to disagree with him. However, the signs of inconsistent bounce are getting bigger and with the sun coming out on Day 2, the pitch might start to break up. That will help the cracks to open up. A day's rest will do good to the Indian bowlers who will come out and concentrate primarily on their lines. They came back well in the final hour, but the lack of control in the two-and-a-half hours prior to that, hurt them. They will start afresh come Friday and look to run through the middle order.

India were all over their lines in the mini session and one expected them to come back harder post Tea. The lines did improve but the result did not vary. The openers continued their run fest and with the Dukes ball getting older and softer, all the bowlers struggled to make it move. Eventually, Ravindra Jadeja managed to get a wicket off a mistake by Crawley, having him caught at first slip for 84, breaking the 166-run stand. That seemed to lift the Indian spirits as the bowling seemed to get better. Debutant Anshul Kamboj did much better in his second spell and managed to get his maiden Test wicket by having Duckett caught behind, for a wonderful 94. The bowling was good in the last hour of play but that blazing opening stand has moved this game quickly at the rate of knotts.

The story completely changed once England came out to bat. Out of nowhere, the dark clouds disappeared and the sun came out in full glory. Add to it, that little shower before Lunch made the ball come nicely onto the bat and the deck seemed totally different from what we had seen during the Indian innings. And on flat tracks, Bazball rarely misses to make its mark. Ben Duckett and Zak Crawley took India by the horns and raced off to around 5 an over. Having required to play around 70 minutes till Tea, they just scored boundaries at will, reaching 77/0 in just 14 overs at the break.

The day began with a big question mark for India. There was no clarity over Rishabh Pant's batting and Ravindra Jadeja was supposed to be their key with the bat. However, he fell in the second over of the day, raising England's hopes of bowling out the visitors under 300. But Shardul Thakur played a valuable hand with Washington Sundar and then, Pant came out bravely to score a few crucial runs to take the visitors beyond 350. At that stage, the weather was murky and some rain had even started to fall once the last Indian wicket fell. Hence, 358 looked like a very big score on this deck.

148/2 in 32 overs in the final session. No doubt as to who won that phase. This has been a solid reply from England and in fact, post the first session on Day 2, it has been all England. In less than 50 overs, they have knocked off more than 60 percent of India's total and the only disappointment for them would be the missing of the centuries by both of their openers.

Should be the last over of the day.

Root has dominated the WTC, currently the leading run scorer with 5807 runs, and if he gets another 193 runs, he will become the first player to score 6000 runs in World Test Championships.