{"id":42079,"date":"2025-08-04T00:30:07","date_gmt":"2025-08-04T00:30:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/42079\/"},"modified":"2025-08-04T00:30:07","modified_gmt":"2025-08-04T00:30:07","slug":"woakes-ready-to-bat-if-needed-says-root-as-england-put-bodies-on-line-to-seal-victory-england-v-india-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/42079\/","title":{"rendered":"Woakes \u2018ready to bat if needed\u2019 says Root as England put bodies on line to seal victory | England v India 2025"},"content":{"rendered":"

Chris Woakes is poised to slip his left arm out of its sling and return to action just four days after a \u00adserious shoulder injury as England, with four wickets in hand, seek the 35 runs required<\/a> to seal the final Test against India and with it the series.<\/p>\n

The scans on the shoulder Woakes injured on the opening day may have suggested he would be out of action for many months, but the 36-year-old is preparing himself to bat if required.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s all in, like the rest of us,\u201d Joe Root<\/a> said. \u201cIt\u2019s been that kind of series, where guys have had to put bodies on the line.<\/p>\n

\u201cHopefully it doesn\u2019t get to that but he\u2019s had some throw\u2011downs and he\u2019s ready if needed. Clearly he\u2019s in a huge amount of pain, but it means a huge amount to him and it just shows the \u00adcharacter and the person that he is, that he\u2019s ready to put his body on the line for England. Hopefully he doesn\u2019t have to.\u201d<\/p>\n

Root\u2019s 39th Test century, and his 195-run partnership with his fellow centurion Harry Brook carried England to the verge of victory only for India to swing momentum back in their direction with three quick \u00adwickets before rain fell to bring the day to an early end. But the manner and timing of his dismissal meant it was a day he looked back on with frustration rather than satisfaction.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was bitterly disappointed not to still be there and get us home,\u201d Root said. \u201cAs an experienced batter in that situation, you\u2019ve got to be able to absorb pressure and understand that they\u2019re allowed to bowl well for periods of time, and then when you get your opportunities to counter that, you take them. I just misexecuted on that occasion. When you\u2019re 100 not out you don\u2019t expect that from yourself.\u201d<\/p>\n

England had reached 301 for three shortly before tea, pursuing a target of 374, when Brook was dismissed, with Root and Jacob Bethell \u00adfollowing soon after the interval as India found fresh impetus. \u201cYou can\u2019t really afford to throw in the towel in a very important Test match,\u201d India\u2019s bowling coach, Morne Morkel, said. \u201cWe\u2019ve seen it so many times before where if you get one you can easily get two or three and create a bit of pressure. There were no hard words or big talk [at tea], it was just to stay calm and work hard.\u201d<\/p>\n

On completing his century Root took off his helmet and put on one of the charity headbands that have been sold around the ground this week in tribute to the former England batter, and Root\u2019s former coach, Graham Thorpe. \u201cThis week it\u2019s been amazing that Surrey and the ECB have \u00adrecognised everything<\/a> he did for \u00adEnglish cricket as a player, as a coach, as a mentor and as a friend to the dressing room, to the game of cricket,\u201d Root said.<\/p>\n

skip past newsletter promotion<\/a><\/p>\n

Subscribe to our cricket newsletter for our writers’ thoughts on the biggest stories and a review of the week\u2019s action<\/p>\n

Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy<\/a>. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy<\/a> and Terms of Service<\/a> apply.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat was on behalf of our team. Everything that he\u2019s given and \u00adsacri\u00adficed for English cricket, it\u2019s just great to see the amount of love there is there for him. He\u2019s someone who impacted my career a huge amount.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Chris Woakes is poised to slip his left arm out of its sling and return to action just…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":42080,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[1721,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-42079","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cricket","tag-cricket","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42079","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42079"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42079\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/42080"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42079"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=42079"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42079"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}