Veteran off-spinner scores remarkable sixth Test ton as spin duo engineers exceptional fightback with bat in hand to put India in command CHENNAI: This is an Indian team which refuses to surrender when the tide turns against it. And when a brave, new Bangladesh looked into their eye and asked tough questions on a murky Thursday morning, two veteran warriors - Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja-had all the answers. It's not everyday that a famed Indian batting lineup gets rattled by a Bangladesh pace attack that is consistently bowling at 140 kmph.
And it's not a common occurrence that an Indian counter-attack with the bat is led by an incredibly attacking Ashwin. Given the situation, the game, the sixth Test hundred that he completed with a little nudge on the leg at the fag end of the day will probably be considered Ashwin's best. The star off-spinner may well be playing his last Test match at his home ground, the MA Chidambaram Stadium .
He is expected to call the shots over the weekend with the ball but he had to be called into action way ahead of schedule. Reduced to 144 for six midway through the second session, getting all out for a score of 225 seemed more than a possibility. By the end of the day, the hosts were 339 for six after losing the first two sessions and now they can control the game.
When Ashwin came on to bat, the Bangladesh pacers thought they would attack him with some short stuff. Hasan Mahmud , Nahid Rana and Taskin Ahmed tried to attack his rib cage, and out came the response with the bat. The pulls and cuts caught the Bangladesh attack off-guard and suddenly the score was 200-plus, with Ashwin starting to look more and more confident.
And when there's an ally of the quality of Ravindra Jadeja (batting 86), life tends to get just a little easier. At such a critical juncture of the game, the left-hander looked completely at ease and with the ball losing its lustre, run scoring suddenly became easier. The beauty of the yet unbeaten 195-run Ashwin-Jadeja partnership reminded the cricket world all over again why India have won 17 consecutive Test series at home, their last defeat coming in 2012 against England.
As the Bangladesh pacers started to tire, Shakib Al Hasan, who joined the team on Tuesday, came on to bowl in the 53rd over. But the highest Bangladesh wicket-taker didn't seem to be in the right rhythm and both Ashwin and Jadeja decided to take him apart. The over-rate of the Bangladesh pacers, too, was slow and that's why after 4 pm, when the sea breeze blew across the stadium, Mahmud and Co.
couldn't avail the new ball, which was available after 80 overs. It considerably eased Ashwin's job as he closed in on the century and the smile on his face said it all when the milestone was achieved. While Ashwin did run away with the glory, the game was opened up by a magnificent spell of fast bowling by Mahmud (4-58).
Mahmud's ability to move the ball both ways accounted for Rohit Sharma , the Indian captain surviving a leg-before shout early on before nicking one to slip soon after. The paceman followed it up with wickets of Shubman Gill and Virat Kohli and it was left to Yashasvi Jaiswal to come up with the rescue act in the first session. A couple of days ago in the nets, the left-hander didn't have a clue where his offstump was.
But he seemed to have worked on it and found a method to deal with the threat against some quality pace of Mahmud and Rana. It was Rana, who can work up a pace of 145 kmph with regularity, induced the nick off Jaiswal's bat in the second session, but by then he had made a mark. More importantly, he had played out time which had taken some of the spice out of the track which became a serious sub-plot in the Ashwin-Jadeja show.
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