India beat England by 10 wickets in the first Test at Mohali

Mohali, December 6: Anil Kumble exposed England's batting limitations against spin to bowl India to a comfortable 10-wicket victory in the first cricket Test. The leg-spinner finished with 6-81 as England crashed to 235 in their second innings to lose the opening match of a three-Test series with more than a day to spare.

Graham Thorpe was the best batsman against spin, scoring a defiant 62 to help England, trailing by 231 runs, avoid the humiliation of an innings defeat.

The left-hander struck eight fours in his 120-ball knock before giving an easy return catch to Kumble.

He, however, received no support from the other end as his team-mates failed to read the leg-spinner.

Indian debutant Iqbal Siddiqui, who batted at No 10 in the first innings, opened the batting this time to score the five runs required for victory off two balls.

Man-of-the-match Kumble was well supported by debutant seamer Tinu Yohannan (2-56) and off-spinner Harbhajan Singh (2-59) on a day when the England batsmen looked uncomfortable against both pace and spin.

The 31-year-old Kumble never allowed the batsmen to settle down with his probing line and length and finished with his 17th haul of five or more wickets in a Test innings.

The initial damage was done by Yohannan, who rocked the top order when he removed openers Mark Butcher (18) and Marcus Trescothick (46) in his lively opening spell in the morning session.

Kumble then dismissed skipper Nasser Hussain (12), Mark Ramprakash (28) and Andrew Flintoff (4) to remind England that all is not well with their batting against a high-quality spin.

Harbhajan, who had wrecked England with a five-wicket haul in the first innings, also chipped in with the wickets of Craig White and James Foster.

England looked for long-innings batsmen to save the game after conceding a big lead, but found none as Trescothick, Butcher and Hussain showed poor shot-selection.

India also capitalised on the chances that came their way to put pressure on the tourists.

Substitute Jacob Martin and Siddiqui brought off splendid diving catches in the deep to account for Butcher and Trescothick.

In contrast, England had missed four catches and one stumping in the first innings to allow their rivals to gain a sizeable advantage.

The tourists were comfortably placed at 68 for no loss before losing three big wickets in the space of 19 runs.

Yohannan provided the breakthrough when he broke the opening-wicket stand between Trescothick and Butcher in the day's ninth over after the tourists had resumed at 34 for no loss.

Butcher was the first to be dismissed. He failed to control a pull-shot and was caught by Martin at deep square-leg.

Trescothick also fell playing one shot too many, pulling Yohannan to Siddiqui after smashing nine boundaries in his 95-ball knock.

He added 30 to his overnight score in the first session, which produced 93 runs in 26 overs.

England suffered a big blow when Hussain inside-edged a Kumble delivery on to his stumps after contributing just 12.

Thorpe and Ramprakash then put on 72 for the fourth wicket, but their efforts were not enough to lift England out of trouble. Kumble surprised Ramprakash with a faster one to trap him leg-before in the post-lunch session and then continued to keep pressure on the remaining batsmen.