England continued to dominate the first test of the four-match test series in Chennai by piling on more runs during the second day. The visiting side batted throughout the day to post 555 runs for the loss of eight wickets with Joe Root notching up yet another double tone, while Ben Stokes scoring a quickfire half-century.
Root and Stokes started the day cautiously to see out the first hour of play. After the initial tough phase, Stokes went for the kill. The southpaw raced to his half-century before the lunch through delightful stroke play. At the other end, Root kept it ticking to tire the Indian bowlers.
Stokes continued to take on bowlers after lunch. The all-rounder eventually perished to Shahbaz Nadeem after scoring 82 runs in 118 balls. The entertaining knock helped England to get quick runs, but his departure did bring a halt to the scoring rate as Indian bowlers looked to bowl a defensive line as the pitch was offering nothing for them.
Root brought up his double century by smashing Ravichandran Ashwin for six. It was his second double century of the year and third big score in the last three test matches away from home. Ashwin got the better of Ollie Pope before Root also missing a straight delivery by Nadeem to bring an end to marathon innings of 218 runs.
Two quick wickets further dried up the scoring rate for English batsmen as Jos Buttler and Dom Bess looked to bat longer instead of scoring quick runs. The wicketkeeper-batsman eventually made an error in judgment to leave an inswinger from Ishant Sharma. The tall fast bowler was on a hattrick after getting rid of Jofra Archer for a duck with a straight delivery.
Bess and Jack Leach saw out the last few overs of the day to make sure that England will be batting into the third day and remain on top in this game. India will have to bat well and long to get close to the first innings score of England. The visiting side has shown in the last two days that they are going to fight hard in this series and make India work hard for every win.