England seamer James Anderson on Friday romped out India’s batting order, picking up five wickets to cut short India’s 1st innings to just 107. On the rain-affected day, Indian batsmen slumped to the conditions, with only skipper Virat Kohli and Ravichandran Ashwin scoring runs in twenties. After the match, Anderson said he is enjoying the competition against India skipper Virat Kohli.
“I was thinking why can’t he (Kohli) edge them like everyone else. I have really enjoyed the contest between him and myself. He is number one in the world for a reason. For me I love playing against the best players in the world, testing yourself and seeing whether you can get the better of them. It is a really thrilling thing to be a part of, and unfortunately, I have not got the better of him yet, but I will continue to try my hardest throughout the rest of the series” he said.
“I don’t think you can think like that (dependency) because we’ve played against all of them before. There are some real quality players in there. I think Kohli is important because he is captain, a leader and he is their best player — number one in the world. But 90 percent of their top seven have scored runs against us in the past so we can’t look just as Kohli as a big wicket,” the 36-year old said.
Anderson took his 27th Test fifer and credited the conditions for helping him in achieving the feat. “I think that if we bowled like that today, with those conditions, we’d bowl most teams in the world out because I think we were that good. We hardly bowled any bad balls, didn’t give them much to hit and when you build pressure like that all day, no matter who you are around the world, it is difficult. We exploited those conditions as well as anyone in the world. I don’t think it’s just the Indian batsmen that would have struggled,” he said.
