Tea India 174 for 4 (Pujara 42*, Iyer 41*, Taijul 2-43, Khaled 1-23) vs Bangladesh
India continued their recovery after being reduced to 48 for 3 in the first session to reach 174 for 4 at tea on the opening day of the Chattogram Test. They were also helped by Nurul Hasan, who dropped both Cheteshwar Pujara and Shreyas Iyer. The two were unbeaten at the time of the interval, their fifth-wicket stand worth 62.
In the first session, Bangladesh had reduced India to 48 for 3 before Pujara and Rishabh Pant led the recovery in their contrasting styles to take them to a respectable 85 for 3 by lunch.
Pujara offered a chance second ball after the break when he drove at full delivery outside off only to edge it low to Nurul’s right. But the wicketkeeper couldn’t latch onto the chance. Pujara was on 12 at that time.
Pujara and Pant added 64 off 72 balls for the fourth wicket before Mehidy Hasan Miraz broke their stand. Having hit the previous ball for a six, his 50th in Test cricket, Pant went back in an attempt to steer Mehidy behind point. The ball, though, kept coming in with the arm to cramp him. The result was a bottom-edge that bounced off the pitch to dislodge the off bail, and Pant walked off for a 45-ball 46.
Iyer started tentatively, edging his first ball, against Mehidy, just past the slip fielder. Then Ebadot Hossain beat both his edges in the same over. But as the innings progressed, he started looking more and more comfortable, and even hit Mehidy for two fours in one over.
Bangladesh had a chance to send him back when he edged a cut off Shakib Al Hasan when he was on 37 but Nurul once again couldn’t hold onto the chance.
Pujara used his feet against the spinners to skip down the track regularly, even if he didn’t look in complete control all the time. Some tight bowling from the Bangladesh bowlers meant India only managed 19 from the last ten overs of the session.
In the morning, when India opted to bat, Bangladesh captain Shakib hoped the grass cover would help his seamers pick up early wickets. But the pitch offered little assistance to the fast bowlers, forcing Shakib to bring himself on as early as the sixth over.
The Bangladesh seamers, Ebadot and Khaled Ahmed, didn’t help their cause either by hardly bowling anything full. Some of the balls did keep low but they were all well outside off. Shakib tried playing around with the field, deploying a leg slip, a catching short midwicket, and a catching cover at various times but to no avail.
It was Taijul Islam who eventually broke through. At the stroke of the drinks break, Shubman Gill tried to lap-sweep him but the ball just dropped on him, inducing a top-edge. Yasir Ali, anticipating the shot, ran around to his left from first slip and gobbled it up.
KL Rahul fell soon after, chopping Khaled onto his stumps. In the next over, Virat Kohli played back to a length ball from Taijul that spun past his outside edge and trapped him lbw as he looked to work the ball into the leg side. That meant India, who had looked in full control at 41 for no loss, were all of sudden in a spot of bother. But Pujara and Pant saw out the rest of the session.
Hemant Brar is a sub-editor at ESPNcricinfo