A middle-order rescue act led by Cheteshwar Pujara (90, 203b, 11x4) and Shreyas Iyer (82 batting, 169b, 10x4) carried India to a respectable 278 for six at Stumps on day one of the first Test against Bangladesh at the Zahur Ahmed Chowdhury Stadium here.
The host could have gone into the second day with significant tailwind if wicketkeeper Nurul Hasan had not grassed a low catch off Pujara when on 12 and Ebadot Hossain had not made a mess of a sitter at deep mid-wicket off Shreyas when on 67.
Ebadot’s misery was compounded when he breached Shreyas’s defence and got the ball to kiss the off-stump only for the bails to budge but not fall.
Much of the day’s cricket was slow burn. Perhaps it had to be after India, which elected to bat, found itself 48 for three on a pitch that was not quite the “batting paradise”. There was uneven bounce from as early as the second over and significant turn, which will surely please India’s three spinners (R. Ashwin, Axar Patel and Kuldeep Yadav).
Still, this is a time when the world seems enthralled by the way England is setting the standards in red-ball cricket, an approach that current India captain KL Rahul has doffed his hat to and Rishabh Pant (46, 45b, 6x4, 2x6) seemingly embraces.
But Pujara is neither a trendsetting tastemaker of swashbuckling things nor does he live aesthetically as someone else. He found the answer within himself and for a good while appeared set for this first three-figure mark in almost four years (since 193 versus Australia in January 2019).
The 34-year-old used his feet well to negate the turn, had the bat well in front of the pad to avoid the leg-before and close-in dismissals and punished the short deliveries by either rocking back to cut or steering them on the leg side.
Shreyas provided the aggressive spark from time to time, like the uppish flick to the mid-wicket fence to get to his half-century and the dance down the track to loft left-arm spinner Taijul Islam over mid-wicket. The duo put on 149 runs for the fifth wicket, which may ultimately prove match-defining.
Through this, Taijul was excellent for Bangladesh (30-8-84-3), bowling a middle and leg-stump line with sufficient drift and repeatedly beating the batters outside off.
He scalped two of the best – Kohli went on the backfoot for a ball that was only deceptively short and paid the price; Pujara thought he had all ends covered, only for the ball to do enough to slip past the bat but not as much to miss the stumps.
Earlier, Rahul and Shubman Gill negotiated the opening hour cautiously. But just as they looked set to up the rate, Gill was caught in the leg-slip area by Yasir Ali, who smartly moved from first slip as the batter shaped to sweep Taijul.
Rahul was bowled off the inside edge by Khaled Ahmed. And when Taijul sent Kohli back and leapt with joy, Bangladesh was clearly on the ascendency, only to be brought back down, slowly and steadily.
Comments
SHARE