Great escape at Old Trafford: Shubman Gill leads the way, Ravindra Jadeja and Washington Sundar seal gritty draw for India

TimesofIndia.com in Manchester: Fifteen overs left, drinks in the middle and Ben Stokes walked towards Ravindra Jadeja with his hand extended for a shake. The England captain was ready to end the game as a draw but Ravindra Jadeja and Washington Sundar didn't move an inch. So didn't captain Shubman Gill in the change room.

Jadeja was in striking distance of his individual hundred and even after Stokes insistence on shaking the hands, the all-rounder maintained, "I can't do anything". The writing was on the wall but it was India's time to have some fun after a long grind. And they did as both Jadeja and Sundar scored their respective hundreds and then finally the shake hands happened.In the backyard of the team which hates the D word, Shubman Gill and Co's great escape - a fighting draw - at Old Trafford will taste as sweet as a comprehensive W.

Five hard fought sessions and four fantastic knocks later, the visitors not only stay alive in the series but will have their tails up going into a mouth-watering finale at The Oval next week. The Manchester Test was nowhere close to India's reach at the half-way mark but the last two days saw them stage an extraordinary fightback with the bat to enforce the draw.

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Bowling was flat, tactics were flatter and the start with the bat on Day 4 pushed them further back but the response from KL Rahul, Shubman Gill, Washington Sundar and Ravindra Jadeja deserves a lot of credit.

For a side which was reduced to 0/2 in the first over of their second essay to lose only two more in the remaining 143 overs, is an insane effort and frustrated England for five long sessions, and forced them to settle for only their second draw under the combination of captain Stokes and coach Brendon McCullum.

They tried everything in and out of the book to make an inroad but nothing worked. It was the right-handed pair of Gill and Rahul on Day 4 before the lefties Sundar and Jadeja stood like a rock on the final day of the Test.

It was a reflection of their match temperament, game awareness and the gumption to bat out time against an opposition which just hates to settle for a draw in the whites. These were individual batting masterclasses stitched together in two daddy stands but something which the dressing room desperately needed after ending up on the wrong side of the 2-1 scoreline post the Lord's Test. They haven't been outplayed or outsmarted in the series so far but the inability to close out the small moments, which have had a big say in the match, have hurt them.

While they are still far from an ideal Playing XI - mostly due to injuries and availability issues - but the exhibition of grit in the last two days in overcast Manchester will do their confidence a world of good. A lot was said about Gill's success overseas but here is after four Tests sitting with four hundreds next to his name and a tally of 732 runs. The two failures in Lord's and in Manchester first innings got the tongues to wag again but he shut the traps for good with a statement ton which is arguably his finest till date.

Captaincy pressure, questions on tactics, scorecard reading 0/2 but the youngster quite literally shut the outside noise and put in an old-fashioned grind to set the base for batters to follow. There were nervy moments, a couple of drop catches, blows to the body but it was all worth it as it allowed his side to have the only favourable result at that stage.There was a tricky period after the wickets of Rahul and Gill in the first session but the response from Sundar and Jadeja was as compact as India would have liked.

Jadeja made the early life count and used all his experience to counter whatever was thrown at him. Four fifties, one hundred and it has been a phenomenal series with the bat for Jadeja and he has been the crisis man for India lower down the order.A victory was out of the picture the moment they dished out an ordinary effort with the ball and it was all about saving the game from there on. With Jadeja behind the wheel on the final day, not only did they fashion that but also did something which not many expected this side, undergoing transition under a 25-year-old captain, to do - stay alive after four Day 5 finishes.