IND vs ENG 2021: Pace, patience, and precision - Mohammed Shami's 3Ps of success
Anyone else in Mohammed Shami's shoes would have been frustrated. Barring a sheepish grin and a 'you-got-lucky' look at the batsman, Shami gave nothing away, not even runs.
He steamed in, banged the ball hard on the surface, extracted that pacy, wobbly movement, and watched as Zak Crawley and Dom Sibley carefully and nervously left the ball on a green tinged Trent Bridge track. Rishabh Pant pouched all of them, chirping away to glory like he usually does.
Shami ended the day with figures of 3/23 after bowling a near-flawless 16 overs. Session one was an absolute tester for the quick, but his potency was on full display when he nabbed Sibley shortly after the break. It was a fullish one and was angled into the stumps. Not in control, the opener flicked it straight to KL Rahul at short midwicket.
Jonny Bairstow, making a last-minute entrance to the England side, was his next scalp. Shami kept his line tight, and was angling in again, rapping the pads flush. Bairstow was pinned to the crease and, with no bat in contact with the cherry, had to make his way back to the pavilion.
Dan Lawrence practically gifted his wicket. Ten out of ten times, batsmen tend to leave or at least nudge those deliveries down. But Lawrence became Shami's third wicket who, by spraying the ball down the leg side, managed to induce a thick edge off the middle-order bat.
Pant took that one, and just like that, Mohammed Shami had three wickets in one session. England, on their part, had slumped, having lost five wickets.
What did Mohammed Shami do right?
A few things, actually. For starters, he did not bowl the lengths he had in the World Test Championship (WTC) final against New Zealand. Mohammed Shami had bowled 19% of his deliveries in the fuller zone.
At Trent Bridge he increased the percentage greatly. 31% of Shami's deliveries were in the full length area.
Taking a cue from his change in lengths was Jasprit Bumrah, who reaped the rewards as well, dismissing Rory Burns and Jos Buttler for ducks.
Shami also varied his pace. The cleverly disguised deliveries meant Sibley and Bairstow had no idea they were being set up. Or if they did, they didn't do much course correction to tackle Shami's subtle variations.
Barring the length adjustment, there was nothing novel about Shami's approach. He's one of those bowlers with monk-like patience, very Peter Siddle, you could say. He nailed the basics on Day One, helping India's case massively.
Shami's twin strikes pretty much torpedoed England's ship. Bumrah dismissed Butler. Shardul Thakur, after missing out on the action for the majority of the innings, bagged the prized wicket of skipper Joe Root and sent Ollie Robinson packing soon after as the hosts were in disarray at 155 for 8.
India will hope for more of these spells from Shami. His 3Ps - pace, patience and precision - have held him and India in good stead, and on Wednesday he lived up to why he was the leader of India's pace battery.
They needed a spark after the WTC debacle, and Mohammed Shami gave them a jolt.