Chattogram, December 15
Kuldeep Yadav sizzled with an all-round show while Mohammed Siraj ran through the Bangladesh top-order as the duo put India firmly in the driver’s seat on Day 2 of the first Test here today.
Playing his first Test in over 22 months, Yadav, who turned 28 on Wednesday, had sensational outings with the bat and ball. Yadav first came up with a career-best 40 from 114 balls in a 92-run eighth-wicket partnership with veteran Ravichandran Ashwin (58) to push India to 404 in their first innings from an overnight score of 278/6.
At stumps, Bangladesh were 133/8 and trailing India by 271 runs. With two wickets in hand, the hosts still need 72 runs to avoid the follow-on.
“I was a bit nervous, I was very lucky to get the first wicket in the first over. Got the momentum back. After a couple of overs, I started feeling well, mixed my pace and variations, tried both the angles, over the wicket and round the wicket,” Yadav said.
Introduced into the attack in the 25th over, the left-arm wrist-spinner struck early and ended the day with figures of 10-3-33-4.
However, it was Siraj who began the proceedings with a wicket off the very first ball of the innings when he induced an edge from Najmul Hossain Shanto (0) with an away-going delivery. Stumper Rishabh Pant dived to his left to make the catch.
Siraj went on to rattle the Bangladesh top-order and later dismissed Zakir Hasan (20) and Litton Das (24) to end the day with impressive figures of 9-1-14-3.
“My approach was to bowl consistently at one place because it is such a wicket that if you try more there are chances to leak runs. My only plan was to hit one spot and I got successful,” Siraj said. — PTI
live on sony ten at 9am
For all the latest Sports News Click Here
