Midway through the afternoon, Edgbaston fell into a Sunday lull. The clouds had closed over, the wind had dropped, in the Hollies Stand the Teletubbies were sitting quietly over their pints, the Pope was thumbing his phone and WG Grace seemed to have nodded off into his beard.
The last chant of Don’t Take Me Home had died out a while back. No one was roaring, shouting, sighing, or singing, and even that one Indian fan who had spent the entire day screaming Virat Kohli’s name over and over again seemed to have lost his voice.
Cheteshwar Pujara can do that to a crowd. They had been spoiled in the morning, when Ben Stokes and Jonny Bairstow had batted like they had breakfasted on benzedrines and brandy.
They have been spoiled all summer by Brendon McCullum’s manic plan to reinvent the way they play and make the game more entertaining by rattling along at four-and-a-half runs an over.