The tension makes you notice things more. It heightens the senses. It lets you see Ben Stokes spread his left arm wide before the start of play to welcome everyone into a huddle, to spread his passion and infuse his players with it.
It lets you see the little boy in a brightly coloured India shirt with ‘Rohit’ written on the back, dancing up and down the aisle in the Compton Stand just after tea. He had begun to believe. The India fans all around him had begun to believe, too.
India were edging closer and closer to their target. Fifty runs to go, 40 runs to go, 30 runs to go. What had seemed impossible a few hours ago had turned to implausible and was starting to look distinctly possible.
The tension was unbearable. The last time I had felt a knot in my stomach like this at a cricket match was during the 2019 World Cup final at Lord’s, when the match between England and New Zealand veered one way and then another and was always, always too close to call.
The tension lets you hear the plaintive air that enters the cheers of the England supporters. ‘Come on Jofra, you can do it,’ one man pleaded as Archer eased into his run-up from the Nursery End and accelerated away from us.
What a day it had been. What a feast of sport. There have been some classic Tests at the Home of Cricket and this was certainly one of them. It was an epic. It was a privilege. It was another reminder of the magic of this form of the game.
It had everything. It had heroes. It had pantomime villains. Hopes rose and were dashed and then rose again. It had comebacks and failures and triumphs and anger and joy and elation and despair.
It had Stokes playing his heart out, Archer bowling like a demon on the fifth day of his first Test match for four years, and providing one of his signature moments by bowling Rishabh Pant, sending his off-stump cartwheeling down the ground and then giving him a send-off to boot.
It had Jasprit Bumrah providing a stubborn cameo with the bat and Ravindra Jadeja compiling an innings of consummate skill and courage to bring the tourists within sight of one of their most famous victories in England.
Stokes bowled for virtually the entire day. That’s how it felt, anyway. I’m not sure I have ever seen a sportsman want to win a match as much as Stokes wanted to win this match.
When he thought he had trapped KL Rahul lbw before lunch, he sunk to his knees like a Christ figure as he appealed desperately to the umpire, looking for relief from his suffering and his yearning.
Both sides played on the edge. There was always needle, most obviously on Sunday morning when Mohammed Siraj screamed in Ben Duckett’s face after he dismissed him. It returned on Monday when India had reached 103-7 and were creeping back into the game and Brydon Carse and Jadeja collided in the middle while Jadeja completed the first of two runs.
Carse grabbed him briefly by the neck as they passed and once he had grounded his bat, Jadeja returned to confront the England bowler. There was plenty of that. Plenty of hard stares from Stokes and glares from Siraj when he came in to form a stubborn last-wicket stand with Jadeja.
This felt a world away from the manufactured excitement of Twenty20. This felt deeper.
And then, when it was getting harder to catch your breath and the man in the row behind muttered ‘Jesus Christ’ when India got another run closer to the total and it seemed this ordeal would never end, Jadeja and Siraj needed only 23 runs to seal their triumph.
Shoaib Bashir was bowling to Siraj. Bashir, who had played the role of bit-part player in all this unfolding drama as Stokes and Archer played the roles of superheroes. Bashir, who was playing with a broken finger that will keep him out of the final two Tests. And Siraj, who had been proud in his defiance.
At first, it seemed Siraj had defended the ball well. He got his bat on it and forced it down into the ground, away from prying hands. As we watched, there was a sigh of disappointment. Another ball defended by India. Another chance gone.
But then there was a strange hiatus. The ball bounced and spun backwards, as if propelled by some invisible force. In his confusion, Siraj tried to jump out of the way of it and it rolled slowly through his legs.
It was like a slow-motion sequence. The ball rolled gently on to the base of Siraj’s wicket and came to rest peacefully against the stumps. And as Siraj stared down in horror, realising what he had done, one bail fell slowly, slowly to the ground.
Pandemonium ensued. There was a delayed roar of triumph from the England fans in the ground. The England players mobbed Bashir. Siraj bowed his head and stayed stock still. At the non-striker’s end, Jadeja was frozen, too, the only sign of his despair a tilt of his head towards the heavens.
Zak Crawley and Joe Root went to console Siraj, just as Andrew Flintoff had consoled Brett Lee after a similarly nail-biting clash between England and Australia at Edgbaston 20 years ago.
They don’t come around too often, days like these. Just like that game, this was one for the ages.
