Bazball never sounds more like a cult than when Jeetan Patel speaks about it. The press pack half-expected him to say "we have got them where we wanted" when informed Jeetan was on his way to address the press conference at the end of day two. The scores were India 587 vs England 77 for 3.
Jeetan is self-aware, give that to him. He acknowledged "you keep laughing at me". One of the lines Jeetan said might as well be a mantra for a cult: "That was yesterday, today is today, tomorrow will be another day."
The problem with cults usually is that while they can offer light and solace to those needing something to hold onto, their experiments, so to speak, aren't backed by independent evidence. They need certain, ahem, conditions for the believers of the cult to find the nirvana.
Bazball's conditions are flat pitches and the recently quick-to-go-soft Duke's balls. Not just flat pitches, but ones that don't deteriorate, ones that result in progressively increasing average over the innings of Tests in the Bazball era in England. There is no moisture left because typically on moist pitches the hard Duke's balls leave indentations, which result in uneven bounce over the course of a Test.
Even so, at 84 for 5, Mohammed Siraj on a hat-trick in the second over of the day, England 503 behind India, was the ultimate test of this mad belief. England have had their bad days in this era, but they have never been so far behind so early in the game. In comes Jamie Smith, a "made" wicketkeeper, playing ahead of accomplished ones, selected for Bazballing reasons, to face the hat-trick ball. And he smashes the hat-trick ball for four through mid-off.
In a sensational assault on India in the rest of the session, Smith and Harry Brook reintroduced the third result to the match when it had seemed England were out of it. The fans in the Hollies sang Oasis and Sweet Caroline, but the cricket was in keeping with the land of the birth of heavy metal. By two guys who look like they have never contemplated long hair let alone anything as rebellious as heavy metal.
To watch that session was to just continuously head-bang for two hours. It was just believers in a trance. They really were in a trance. Brook said they didn't discuss any plans or match state. They just watched ball and hit ball. Brook might have fumbled his lines a little, but Smith went at a strike rate of bazillions with a control percentage of 90-plus.
India played their part. They banged on the drums. The ball had gone soft, and they were willing to buy a wicket. Prasidh Krishna was sacrificed for the plan. He bowled two good overs of line and length, drawing an edge that flew through the sparsely populated slips, drew a rare miss from Smith, and then all of a sudden, he started to bang the ball into the middle of the pitch.
Two fielders on the hook, Smith went in front of square. Another man went out, and he went over them. Another fielder back, and he went in front of mid-on. Then over mid-on. Not long ago Bazball was killing Test cricket with lifeless pitches, but now it was reviving it with sensational batting.
India had so many runs in the bag they didn't need to bowl for control, but what do you do with zombies who keep coming at you and don't seem to care about the match situation or the result? That fear of getting out is the bedrock of batting; it is what makes risk management necessary. No matter the pitches, Bazball is disrupting that fear.
In the lunch break, though, India decided to use that bank of runs to their advantage and go hunting only with the second new ball. ODI fields and possibly tiring batters resulted in a slower session following which India struck back just as gloriously with the second new ball, but that one session of mad belief did leave them shaken.
Just as well that the new ball created enough jeopardy to restore some balance for those not in on the cult. It still doesn't seem to matter to the believers, though. There is a second innings to come as well.