Test cricket in turbo mode: Is the game's oldest format going through a major shift?

Often in sports, captaincy and coaching are merely an extension of the playing style and attitude of individuals. For instance, Diego Simeone, during his playing days, was a combative midfielder and under him, Atletico Madrid grew into a feisty unit, often playing "rough football". 

In his last three years in Test cricket, Brendon McCullum was the second-fastest scoring batter with a strike-rate of 77. The fourth name in the list was Ben Stokes. So when they took charge of the England Test team as head coach and captain respectively, everyone sort of knew what to expect but how his team would respond to that remained a big question. 

Within a month, the world saw an orthodox player like Joe Root reverse-scoop Tim Southee for six in a Test match. It showed how England embraced McCullum's style of coaching, termed as "Bazball" by ESPNCricinfo's UK editor Andrew Miller.

Under McCullum and Stokes, England saw a surge in batting run rate. Since they took over, England have maintained a run rate of 4.8 runs per over where no team has managed even 4. McCullum gave his players freedom and it brought the best out of them. And suddenly a team that had won just two out of 17 matches before Bazball lost just four in their next 17.

It has been a very effective approach but many believed it would be an exclusive one given England's supreme white-ball skills. Players like Jonny Bairstow, Harry Brook, Ben Duckett who are players with tremendous white-ball skills benefitted from England's new style of play. 

Earlier this year, Stuart Broad predicted that other teams would try to play like England in Tests. "There has been some attention on whether other teams will try to emulate our positive approach to Test cricket and, although it hasn't been evident yet, they will in time because players have so much expansion in their games now," he said.

This was five months ago. The change wasn't quite evident at that time but it surely is now. 

Right now, a Test series between Pakistan and Sri Lanka is going on. In the first game of the series, in response to Sri Lanka's 312, Pakistan raced to 221 for five in 45 overs (going at 4.9 runs per over) at the end of the second day. And on the fifth morning, they chased down a tricky target of 131 going at over four an over. In the second game, they notched up a mammoth 576 for five at a fair clip too (4.3 runs per over).

"The last Test cycle gave us a big reflection, and this management was very firm that one of the things that was lacking with us not winning Test matches or not finishing them off, was that we weren't scoring at such a high rate as our opposition. That has been a concentrated effort," said Pakistan number three Shan Masood.

Now that's exactly why England have started playing aggressively - to get results. That has sometimes worked against them but they never doubted it. Many believe Stokes' early first-innings declaration was behind England's loss in the first Ashes Test but fast bowler Ollie Robinson wrote that McCullum said in the dressing room, "[It] feels like we've won, lads".

Statistician Mazher Arshad revealed that Pakistan had a rule in the camp before the Sri Lanka tour that anyone who batted three dots would be out at the nets. That's how they are trying to bat positively in Tests.

Their opponents Sri Lanka recently got into trouble against Ireland as the latter scored a mammoth 492 in the first innings. Ireland had used up more than a day and half and given Sri Lanka had to bat last and the weather, they needed a big total and at a rapid pace. 

Sri Lanka batted six overs more than Ireland and scored 212 more runs, taking the game completely away. Often this very approach has worked well in these situations. 

The second fastest-scoring team after England in the last 12 months in Tests has been Bangladesh and there have been a lot of instances where they found success, albeit sporadically, playing aggressively. Sri Lanka and New Zealand have also maintained a run rate of over 3.5 during this period. 

"But in certain types of wickets, when you try and attack every ball, you will falter. There are both advantages and disadvantages to this approach," said Ravichandran Ashwin. But for a team that has batters having brilliant ball-striking ability, it was a matter of time for India to show that they could go the aggressive way too.

In the second Test against the West Indies, India smashed the fastest team hundred in the history of the format (12.2 overs). They had a run rate of 7.54 in that innings. The approach was required to give India a chance to win but when you have batters like Yashasvi Jaiswal, Rohit Sharma, Shubman Gill and Ishan Kishan, you can do that more often than not.

With the introduction of T20 cricket, the overall run rate in Tests has increased and given England's overwhelming success, more and more teams could look to play positively in this format. "It's probably the way that red-ball cricket is going," Mark Boucher said last year and you can sense that Test cricket is going through a major shift.