Jaiswal hits unbeaten 179 but England manage to strike regularly

Yashasvi Jaiswal’s second Test ton offset, to some extent, the mistakes that India’s other batters committed after opting to bat on day one of the Vizag Test. His unbeaten 179 powered India to 336/6 by the end of the day with the next highest score of the day being a mere 34.

Jaiswal, after a fifty in the first Test, applied himself more in the second and worked his way to a stroke-filled hundred, getting to the landmark with an emphatic six over long on. The left-handed opener was the glue around which India’s batting revolved on a pitch that held no demons. He had partners stitching together stands but throwing it away eventually.

At the start of play, so intent was skipper Rohit Sharma in the defending that he missed out on a few boundary opportunities when the spinners erred. His 41-ball innings saw no boundaries being scored. He eventually fell glancing debutant Shoaib Bashir straight into the hands of legslip.

Jaiswal, meanwhile, continued to milk the spinners, cashing in on the boundary opportunities when they erred in lengths. He was briefly helped by a positive partner in Shubman Gill, who toyed with the spinners lengths by using his feet as well as sweeping occasionally.

But a well-set Gill fell to a well-laid trap by England, as James Anderson came in for a second spell before Lunch. Gill tried to mess with Anderson’s lengths by jumping out early but never looked in comfort, edging past the slip cordon dangerously. He eventually fell chasing a wide delivery and nicking to the keeper on 34, to be dismissed by the bowler for the fifth time in seven innings.

Jaiswal brought up his fifty in the company of Shreyas Iyer and the duo were held tight soon after the Lunch break with some disciplined bowling. The shackles were broken when Jaiswal went ahead after a sharp chance was put down at slip by Root and proceeded to hit three boundaries in a row to race into the nineties. Soon after he got his first Test hundred on home soil, India suffered another setback when a restless Iyer got an underedge that was pouched safely by Ben Foakes, giving Tom Hartley his first wicket of the game.

England had managed to keep India in check despite the batters getting off to starts with partnerships worth 40, 49, 90, 70 and 52 being nipped in the bud with regular strikes. This became the first instance of each of No.3, No. 4, No. 5 and No. 6 all getting dismissed between 25 and 35 in the same innings in Test cricket.

Patidar was a trifle unfortunate to be out with the ball trickling onto the stumps after some extra bounce had him defending awkwardly. Axar Patel, given a promotion to No. 6, and KS Bharat however were guilty of throwing away starts, each cutting the spinner to backward point towards the end of the day’s play leaving England with a big boost, despite Jaiswal’s marathon innings.

Brief Scores:
India 336/6 (Yashasvi Jaiswal 179*, Shubman Gill 34, Shreyas Ayer 27, Rajat Patidar 32, Axar Patel 27; Shoaib Basheer 2-100,  Rehan Ahmed 2-69) vs England