Bringing Wood in my place against Bumrah was a mistake: Anderson

Leeds:  England captain Joe Root’s decision to remove James Anderson and bring in Mark Wood to rattle Jasprit Bumrah was where England missed the plot and lost the second Test against India at Lord’s last week, said pace bowler James Anderson.

England had India on the ropes at the end of the fourth day but the visitors ran riot with an 89-run unbeaten ninth-wicket partnership between Jasprit Bumrah and Mohammed Shami, who scored a half-century.

“When Joe [Root] touched on getting a few things wrong I think potentially the minute Bumrah came in he brought Mark Wood on and took me off. I think that’s the sort of thing he was talking about as in letting the emotion get the better of us,” said Anderson on BBC’s podcast while referring to Root’s admission on making mistake on the fifth day.

“That was the sort of, ‘right, it’s time for him to have a taste of his own medicine’ type of thing rather than trying to get him out. You could keep me on and just me trying to just get him out normally and see if he plays any big shots whereas he went with Mark Wood straight away,” added Root.

Anderson, who has been among wickets and became the third-highest wicket-taker in Test cricket surpassing India’s Anil Kumble, also had an altercation with India skipper Virat Kohli.

The 39-year-old said he was impressed with the way his side bowled during India’s second innings on the fourth day while keeping their emotion in check.

“But I thought the way we bowled in the second innings was pretty much the opposite: we took the emotion out of it, we just focused on the process of bowling them out, keeping the runs down. They didn’t go anywhere the whole of the fourth day and then we got the rewards towards the end of the day with a few wickets,” added Anderson.

He praised India for channelising emotion well.

“They are a passionate side, they use emotion differently to how we use it. They channel it well. We saw it on the last day. So that’s something we’ve got to think about going into the last three games,” Anderson said further.

(IANS)