The distraction game: Ringing in the sweep to take India off track

Though considerable, sweeps and reverse sweeps have also facilitated England's fluent scoring off orthodox shots

- Somshuvra Laha

To what extent did the reverse sweep and sweep alter the course of the Hyderabad Test? Quantitatively, not by much. Out of England's first innings score of 246, 41 runs (just 16%) came from sweep, slog sweep and the reverse sweep. That increased to 24.5% in the second innings with 103 out of 420 runs. Bulk of the score in both innings was still made off the traditional shots. Like the drive, that accounted for 39% of the first innings score and 35% of the second. Which tells us the only reason the chatter is so focused on the reverse sweep is because England have successfully implemented it as a strategy to distract.

Zak Crawley indicated as much. "I think sweeping and reverse sweeping, when it's spinning, is a good option. It takes the spin out of plan," said the England opener here on Wednesday. This isn't the first time a visiting team tried to sweep Indian spinners.

Back in the 1987 World Cup, Graham Gooch showed the way, sweeping Maninder Singh and Ravi Shastri in the semi-final. So emboldened was Nasser Hussain by the returns of the sweep shot during the tour of Pakistan in 2000 that he went ahead and even swept Muttiah Muralitharan in 2001. England won both those tours. At home, look no further than Damien Martyn who seized on every opportunity to sweep during Australia's 2-1 win in 2004.

Joe Root was at the top of his sweeping game on the last tour when he scored a double hundred in the first Test but even he has wholeheartedly joined this growing English tribe looking to explore the reverse game.