As it happened - England vs India, 5th Test, Edgbaston, 3rd day

Pujara brings up his fifty in the last over of the day, stepping out, meeting Root on the full, and working him to deep square leg. It's been a classic Pujara innings, with, dare I say, a solidity reminiscent of his pre-pandemic batting.

That single brings up the 50 partnership between Pujara and Pant as well. Pant sees out the last four balls of the day, except the very last ball is a bit of a hands-on-head moment. The ball is a touch short, and it keeps a touch low. Pant goes for the cut and either misses or bottom-edges it (there's been no replay, but England's reactions suggest there was an edge), and Billings fails to gather it behind the stumps.

Anyway, India end the day 125 for 3. Their lead has swelled to 257, and you'd say it puts them in the driver's seat, especially considering they only need a draw to seal the series win, and can theoretically bat on and on without worrying about a declaration. That's a possibility if rain enters the picture.

But if we get the full last two days, India are by no means safe yet. England come into this series on the back of successful chases of 277, 299 and 296 in their last three Tests. If they can separate this pair early tomorrow morning, England could still limit their target to something in the range of 350.

After three days, then, this Test match remains beautifully poised, even if India are currently the happier side by a distance. Their heroes today have been their bowlers - Mohammed Siraj finished with four wickets but at least a couple of them were partly down to the pressure Jasprit Bumrah and Mohammed Shami relentlessly applied - and Pujara, who's made a vital third-innings fifty in his comeback Test. But the man who most lit up the day's play was probably Jonny Bairstow, who went full Bairsball to bring up his third hundred in his last three Test matches.

We'll have a full report up shortly for you to peruse. Until then, goodbye.

Anderson goes round the wicket to Pujara, who's on 49. The intention is to bowl short and at his body from that angle. First ball, Pujara rides the bounce and dabs into the off side, looking for a single before deciding to turn back. He's already been spoken to by the umpires for running on the middle of the pitch, and he gets an official warning after this ball, because his first step - and maybe his second as well - takes him close to that danger area.

Next ball is short again, the line starting a little further outside leg stump. It keeps slightly low, and Pujara turns his back on the ball, making sure his gloves and bat aren't in the way of it, and ends up wearing it on his left bicep. We've all seen him do this before.

He sees out the over calmly, defending or weaving out of the way as the ball dictates, showing no urgency to go from 49 to 50. India are 123 for 3, and they lead by 255.

Joe Root comes on to bowl to Rishabh Pant, whose wicket he took in the first innings. He bowls six loopy, wide tempters, and Pant leaves all six alone. India are 116 for 3, leading by 248.

It's happened for the second time in this innings. A regular feature of this batch of Dukes balls.

And it would have been another massive wicket. Pujara had left so many balls outside off stump even when they were shaping or nipping into him, and Stokes gets one to curve back in dangerously late and smack his front pad. Big appeal, not given. England go for a review, and it comes back as umpire's call, with ball-tracking suggesting the ball was coming back enough to clip the outside of off stump.

Pujara survives. He's batting on 37, and India are 86 for 3.

Kohli trudges off after scoring 20. When will England see him next in a Test match?

He looked good in getting to 20, but there was little he could do about the Ben Stokes delivery that dismissed him. Tight line close to off stump, and then it straightens and absolutely leaps up off a length. Tries to get his bat out of the way, but it kisses his glove on its way to Sam Billings. The ball clangs off Billings' gloves, but Joe Root is alert to the rebound at first slip.

India are 76 for 3. They lead by 208, and Rishabh Pant has walked in at No. 5 once more.

Pujara's moved to 32, and Virat Kohli, almost unnoticed, to 15 off 27.

One thing has struck me about Pujara's batting today, and even in the first innings. Kumar Sangakkara mentioned durng a Sky commentary stint on day one that he's become more side-on in his set-up, and it feels like this is helping him adjust to late away movement. During the lean phase that eventually led to his getting dropped, he often got out to balls angling in towards off stump and straightening late. Replays would often show him getting a little squared up, playing the initial angle and shaping to play the ball towards mid-on. Today, it feels like he's playing this sort of ball a little later, and towards extra-cover.

Potts gets one to nip back into Pujara, and it strikes him just about in line with off stump as he comes forward to defend, but it's a big stride forward, and height always looks like it'll come to the batter's rescue. England review the not-out decision, and ball-tracking says it would have bounced over the stumps.

India are 57 for 2.

Not the best shot from Hanuma Vihari. A full outswinger outside off, and he goes hard at a flourishing cover drive and edges to Bairstow at third slip. The thing about Vihari is that his set-up allows him to drive down the ground or through midwicket, but if you shift your line wider, he doesn't really lean over the cover drive and get his head on top of the ball. This is exactly what happens when Broad invites him to go through the covers.

India are 43 for 2.

Jack Leach gets an exploratory over to end the session, and India see it out safely, though it will interest everyone concerned that the first ball of the over - short, wide, and otherwise entirely forgettable - turned absolutely square.

India are 37 for 1, with Pujara batting on 17 and Hanuma Vihari on 10. Their partnership is now worth 33, and India's lead has grown to 169.

Stuart Broad has been moving it back into Pujara quite sharply, but he's still been leaving a lot of balls in the corridor. It's been fascinating to watch. In between, he's got on his toes for one exquisite back-foot punch as well. He's batting on 13 off 21, and India are 20 for 1.

In their first innings, India scored 374 runs off the bat (runs other than extras), and of them, 59 came when their batters were not in control. England's batters, meanwhile, scored 58 of their 249 runs via false shots. India took a first-innings lead of 132, but it could have easily been quite a lot more.

James Anderson to Shubman Gill. First ball, first ball of India's innings, is left alone. The second is a touch too full, and Gill drives it effortlessly for four, straight of mid-off. Next ball is on a perfect length in the corridor, shaping away a little, and maybe bouncing a little extra too. Gill hangs his bat out and edges it straight to second slip.

It's a similar dismissal in some ways to the one in the first innings, but this one's maybe slightly fuller, and Gill's weight is more on his front foot than his back foot. Not that it changes the outcome in any way.

Potts begins this Siraj over with a top-edged hook for four followed by a cleared-front-leg baseball swat for six, and then he tries to create room and punch a leg-stump ball through the covers. Ends up edging thickly towards second slip, where Shreyas Iyer falls forward and to his right to take the messiest of low catches.

There's a bit of doubt over whether the ball carries into his fingers, and then he juggles it and only completes the catch on the second attempt. It's one of those that ends up going the way of the soft signal, and Aleem Dar's soft signal was out.

Siraj finishes with 4 for 66, and England are bowled out for 284. India have an extremely handy lead of 132.

He always creates a bit of an angle into the stumps with his beyond-the-perpendicular release, and he also bowls that wobble-seam inducker a lot. All that combines to stymie Billings' attempt to open his bat face and guide the ball down to third man. He's bowled off the inside edge, and England are nine down, still trailing by 149.

India have peppered Stuart Broad with the short ball ever since he walked in, and while that approach didn't serve him particularly well when he had ball in hand, it sends him back quickly. A miscued slog ends up ballooning into Rishabh Pant's gloves, and England are 248 for 8.

Well, here they are:

Bumrah has bowled 114 balls, out of which he has induced 36 not-in-control responses. That's a not-in-control percentage of 31.6.

Shami has induced 40 false shots in 114 balls. A not-in-control percentage of 35. Thirty five percent! That's better than one in three balls.

Incredible stuff, really.

First ball of a new spell. The full outswinger that's just short of safely driveable. Bairstow goes hard at the cover drive, edges it thickly, and it goes straight to Virat Kohli at first slip. Straight to him, but an excellent catch, because that ball was going like a rocket towards his left shoulder.

Jasprit Bumrah has bowled a searing post-lunch spell, beating the bat multiple times in the channel, and looking every now and then to slip in the yorker. He does that and smacks Bairstow's pad on the full with one that's tailing in late, but Richard Kettleborough is unmoved.

If you're the captain, and you're bowling and you're convinced you have someone lbw, are you likelier to call for an unwise review? Not sure, but this one looked like it was veering down the leg side, and DRS only confirms it.

England are 239 for 6.

136 at Trent Bridge. 162 (and 71*) at Headingley. And now 100*, off just 119 balls, at Edgbaston. What an incredible, incredible summer Jonny Bairstow is having.

He's rushed through the 90s, as you might expect. Went from 91 to 95 off the first ball of the session, clipping Thakur gloriously between midwicket and a deepish mid-on, and now he's got to his hundred with a precise back-foot stab, again off Thakur, with Ravindra Jadeja, amazingly, overrunning the ball and slipping on the square boundary to allow the ball to cross the rope.

Shiva Jayaraman picks out the quality that's made Jonny Bairstow's summer so special:

Jonny Bairstow has scored 485 runs in Tests in England this summer at a strike rate of 110. It’s obvious that to score at that pace, he’s had to hit a lot of boundaries. Almost 67% of his runs have come in boundaries – 75 of them, including 12 sixes. But there have been very few shots in anger: the highlight of his batting this summer has been his timing and how well he’s connected his shots.

Only four of the 75 boundaries that he’s hit have come off false shots. He’s been in control of his boundary shots 94.7% of time. Including him this season, 44 batters have hit 50 or more boundaries in a season in Tests in England in the last ten years. Only two of them, Hashim Amla in 2017 (96%) and Ian Bell in 2014 (95%), hit boundaries with more control than Bairstow in one season. However, neither of those two batters came close to the frequency with which Bairstow has hit boundaries this season: he has hit a boundary every 5.9 deliveries on average – by far the lowest of those 44 batters. In comparison, Amla in 2017 hit one every 12.5 balls and Bell hit one every 11.4 balls. Bairstow has been in complete control of the mayhem he's caused.

Thakur appeals for lbw after Bairstow misses a cross-bat jab against an inducker, and Richard Kettleborough's finger immediately shoots up, but Bairstow reviews immediately and is vindicated when Ultra Edge shows a spike as the ball passes the inside edge.

Next ball, Bairstow dabs down to deep third and brings up his half-century stand with Sam Billings. Billings, since you ask, has only contributed seven runs to the stand.

Minutes later, the players rush off the field as a light rain begins to sprinkle down. England are 200 for 6.

A welcome break for India, you'd think. It gives their bowlers more time to rest, and it also takes some momentum away from Bairstow, who has continued to find the boundary frequently with some truly jaw-dropping shots. He's now batting on 91 off 113.

In the 42nd over of England's innings. It happened at a similar stage in India's innings too, and it's happened multiple times over this summer.

Nagraj Gollapudi reports from Edgbaston:

On Friday morning, shortly before Jasprit Bumrah walked out to the toss, India head coach Rahul Dravid took Virat Kohli aside side. The Indians had just started warming up. Dravid put his arm around Kohli’s shoulder and spoke for a minute or so. You can safely assume he was telling the former India captain to guide Bumrah when need be in the field.

On Sunday morning, in an intense first hour where the teams exchanged hard punches, Kohli played a vocal role, jousting with England's batters as well as helping Bumrah with bowling changes.

In a chat with bcci.tv that came out on Saturday, Dravid spoke about Bumrah’s elevation to captaincy for the Edgbaston Test, but was clear about what he wanted the fast bowler to focus on.

Here’s what Dravid said:

“We are missing Rohit as a skipper, but it’s a great opportunity for Jasprit to be able to lead the side. For him, someone who has really been a big pillar on the success that we built our fast bowling department on. He has led that fast-bowling attack really well. Also, he commands the respect of the team. That’s a really important thing as a leader: you’ve got to perform on your own, you've got to be able to do the difficult things for the team when it is required and Jasprit has done that many a times in red-ball cricket and even in the white-ball format of the game.

"Obviously on the tactical side of things, the captaincy side of things, bowling changes, field placings, he is only going to get better if he does it. It is not easy. He has not captained ever, [or] captained a lot, so obviously that is going to be a challenge. But we’ll have to support him through that – it is not easy for a fast bowler to captain as well considering the fact that he has to look after his own bowling, he has to set fields while he is bowling or he is going to think about fielding changes. [I] had a couple of conversations with him over the last couple of days to just tell him to just to relax and we need him probably more as a bowler rather than [as] a captain. And we can support him on a lot of the other stuff.”

Wow. How often does a team drop Ben Stokes twice and suffer minimal damage? We've already mentioned Thakur putting him down off Shami. Now Thakur comes into the attack for the first time, and Stokes charges him and looks to hit him down the ground. Thakur, from over the wicket, sees him coming and floats the ball wider. Reaching for it, Stokes hits it in the air and not quite off the middle, a low chance that goes straight to Bumrah at mid-off. It's a sitter and he puts it down.

Next ball, Stokes gets on the front foot and actually middles a straight hit. It's flying to Bumrah's left at mid-off, and it's a half-chance if it's a chance at all, but this time he throws himself across and pulls off a spectacular two-handed grab. Stokes is out for 25, and England are 149 for 6.

Excuse the ridiculous pun, but Bairstow, who was batting on 16 off 65 balls not too long ago (SR 24.62), is now batting on 50 off 81 balls. He's hit six fours in the intervening 16 balls, most of them timed with chilling precision.

Perhaps the best of them was a short-arm jab off Mohammed Siraj through midwicket, more a straight-bat punch than a horizontal-bat pull, and it seemed kind of fitting that the fielder running desperately to his left and diving in vain was Shubman Gill, who plays that particular shot really well.

Anyway, this has been a superb counterattack from Bairstow (mostly) and Stokes. England are 148 for 5 in 37 overs.

Bairstow and Stokes shift gear after the first half hour, hitting four fours across the 34th and 35th overs. Then Stokes steps out to Shami, looks to hit him inside-out, and ends up confounded by a bit of away seam movement and extra bounce. He slices the ball high over the off side, and Shardul Thakur, shuffling backwards and to his left at cover, gets under it with the reverse-cup and puts down the chance.

England are 130 for 5 when that happens, and Stokes is on 18.

Then Bairstow smacks the next two balls to the boundary, an effortless flick to bring up the 50 partnership, followed by a shimmy down the track to chip the ball back over the bowler's head. He's looking extremely dangerous at the moment.

Shami and Bumrah have bowled with venom and beaten both batters' edges multiple times. Stokes has looked to step out of his crease on a few occasions, with mixed results. Bairstow, his strike rate pinned down to under 30 after a series in which he rattled along at well over a run a ball, exchanged words with Virat Kohli and immediately went for a big, booming drive only to be beaten by a Shami outswinger. Both batters have picked up fours down the ground when the bowlers have erred on the full side.

It's all happened, and Stokes and Bairstow are still there. England are 110 for 5 in 33 overs. And thanks to all the rain breaks yesterday and also the overnight rest the players have had, Shami and Bumrah have bowled 30 of those 33 overs. As I write this, Shami begins a new over, his 17th.