Veteran India off-spinner Ravichandran Ashwin did extremely well for the hosts and put them in the driver’s seat as he managed to dismiss Will Young in the final moments on Day 4 of the first Test. Notably, he managed to hit a fifty in the first innings.
Set a target of 284 for New Zealand, the Kiwis openers had played four overs on Day 4 before the stumpings. However, Ashwin didn’t miss the chance. In his final ball of the day, he removed Young as well. Ashwin bowled a tossed one right up to the batsman, but it had a low bounce and got a huge turn which struck Young on the pad, and an appeal came which umpire Virender Sharma gave in.
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However, they took the DRS and the ball-tracking showed that the ball would have gone down the leg side, missing the fifth stump. And, once again Nitin Menon and Virender Sharma’s poor umpiring in the match made headlines. And, New Zealand ended at 4/1 with Latham and nightwatchman, William Sommerville, remaining unbeaten.
After the day’s game, Shreyas Iyer, who smashed a hundred in the first innings and a fifty in the second, said: “I had been in this situation before as well, not with the Indian team but with my Ranji team. Mindset was to play the session and play as many balls as possible. I wasn’t thinking too far ahead, was just focusing on the present. (On being the first Indian to score a ton and a fifty in debut Test) Yeah, I knew about it. When I came back, one of my teammates told me about it.”
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He continued: “Yeah, many others have done it from other teams but I was told I am the first from India. It feels good but the most important thing is to win the match. Rahul Sir had told me to bat as many balls as possible and I was determined to do that. We felt that 250 including the first innings lead would have been a good score, so we’re very happy with where we are now. Actually, not a lot was happening with the wicket today, the ball was keeping a bit low. The talk was to get to a competitive total and I feel that it’s a really good total. We have real spin power, so hopefully we can get the job done tomorrow.”
