He took 3 for 57 in the first innings at The Oval.
Not a great bowler, but a bowler of great balls. Nothing describes Josh Tongue better than this after his recent performance in the fifth Test of the Anderson-Tendulkar Trophy at The Oval. Tongue returned with three for 57 as England bowled out India for 224 in the first innings. In the second, he accounted for the big wicket of KL Rahul before stumps on day two.
Leading the five-match series by 2-1, the hosts came into the final Test with a worn-out pace battery. With captain Ben Stokes also ruled out, England were forced to revamp their pace attack. They stuck with Chris Woakes for the fifth game on the trot, and brought in Gus Atkinson, Jamie Overton, and Tongue.
It exposed the lack of depth in England’s pace bowling resources as most of them struggled for control in lively conditions. Atkinson was the pick of the bowlers with a five-wicket haul while Tongue managed to take three.
Banged it in the middle and way down the leg side. Five wides. This is how Tongue started his first spell on Thursday morning. He bowled two more wides in that same over. Throughout the day, he struggled to get his radar right, straying on both sides of the wicket.
It took him a while to get into the rhythm, but he kept bowling wayward. That didn’t stop him from making an impact, however, as he bowled a couple of unplayable deliveries to dismiss Sai Sudharsan and Ravindra Jadeja.
In the 35th over of the innings, he bowled a top-of-the-stump length delivery to Sudharsan from round the wicket. The left-hander had to play it, but it nipped away late to take an outside edge. Tongue produced a carbon copy of it four overs later, dismissing Jadeja off a slightly shorter length. Tongue started the second day with another five wides before trapping Karun Nair with a superb delivery.
Like déjà vu, but with receipts. pic.twitter.com/vUF9F6ccaZ
— England Cricket (@englandcricket) July 31, 2025
Funnily, you would think facing someone like Tongue must be extremely frustrating. When a batter is facing literal robots like Pat Cummins, he knows what line is coming, what length is coming. Ball after ball. When you’re batting against Tongue, you have no idea where the next ball is going to land or how it’s going to behave.
It wasn’t just batters who were perplexed by the whole thing. Tongue had fans and experts scratching their heads as they had no clue how to rate him. Not often do you come across a guy who is so good and so bad at the same time.
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It is no secret that Josh Tongue lacks control. But he has this knack of bowling great balls out of nowhere. If we recall The Ashes in 2023, he started poorly in the second Test before cleaning up Usman Khawaja and David Warner with two in-swinging rippers around the wicket.
Warner GONE! 🤩
— England Cricket (@englandcricket) June 28, 2023
S̶t̶u̶a̶r̶t̶ ̶B̶r̶o̶a̶d̶ Josh Tongue gets his man! #EnglandCricket | #Ashes pic.twitter.com/3sw6FSU2To
Tongue has the attributes that can make a really good Test bowler. He has the pace, consistently bowling at over 140 kmph. He can move the ball both ways and is reasonably tall. A case in point was the way he troubled KL Rahul consistently in the second innings at The Oval before finally dismissing him with a peach.
If he can work on his control and produce more spells like the one he did against Rahul, Tongue can be quite a headache for the opponents. He is 27 years of age, so he has that in his favour as well. All he needs is continued backing from the England management. And looking at their pace bowling depth, Tongue should get it.
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