As a lifelong cricket enthusiast, I have been following the England versus India five match, men’s Test series played over this summer, which ended a few days ago in an honourable drawn series.

1st Test: Leeds, June 20 – 24, 2025

India: 471 & 364

England: 465 & 373/5

England won by 5 wickets

2nd Test: Birmingham, July 02 – 06, 2025

India 587 & 427/6d

England 407 & 271

India won by 336 runs

3rd Test: Lord’s, July 10 – 14, 2025

England 387 & 192

India 387 & 170

England won by 22 runs

4th Test: Manchester, July 23 – 27, 2025

India 358 & 425/4

England 669

Match drawn

5th Test: The Oval, July 31 – August 04, 2025

India 224 & 396

England 247 & 367

India won by 6 runs

The results presented above only begin to tell the story of what many rightly deem to be a great test series, which was anything but one sided and more like a continual series of to and fro as teams swapped places when it came to holding the upper hand, and with many outstanding individual performances by players from both teams. Whilst I was disappointed that England being in a position to win the last Test and thus the series, fell away at the end to one of those fantastic individual performances. Despite great performances and true attritional Test cricket played in the right spirit, both sides showed flaws. While that means neither team can be placed in the truly great category, they were brilliant adverts for Test cricket and have done more than enough to justify my enthusiasm, now in my dotage. I hope England’s next Test series against Australia, in Australia, starting at the end of the year, will prove just as exciting!