Umesh, Ashwin's 4-fers help India hog Day 1 limelight

Dhaka: Umesh Yadav and Ravichandran Ashwin's four-ers helped India hog the limelight on the first day of the second Test by skittling out Bangladesh for 227 here at Shere Bangla National Stadium on Thursday.Electing to bat first, Bangladesh openers failed to give a good start, but the hosts managed to put up a respectable total with the help of a fantastic half century by Mominul Haque on his Test comeback and few other batsmen who made handy contributions.

Litton Das and Mushfiqur Rahim played a couple of attacking shots, but left the scene, falling to the experienced Indian bowling attack.Jaydev Unadkat, who made his Test comeback after 12 years, was very impressive and looked the most threatening of all Indian bowlers, but ended up with two wickets, while Umesh and Ashwin bagged four wickets each.

From 213/5, Bangladesh botched up and lost the last five wickets for 14 runs.In reply, the Indian openers - KL Rahul and Shubman Gill - survived a handful of overs.

Rahul looked nervous as he survived a few close calls, but tomorrow when he walks onto the pitch along with Shubman, they would look to be positive.
Earlier, a lot of eyebrows were raised when Kuldeep Yadav, the Player of the Match of the first Test, was rested.

Bangladesh openers survived the first hour unscathed with a lot of luck going their way. Zakir Hasan got an early reprieve when Mohammad Siraj dropped him off Umesh batting on 2.

Unadkat picked his maiden Test wicket and troubled the Bangladesh batsmen constantly with extra bounce. Najmul Hossain Shanto fell in the very next over while offering no shot to a straight ball from Ashwin.

Bangladesh were brave to send in two more left-handers who did a decent job to ensure no further setbacks. Ashwin could have removed the counterattacking Shakib Al Hasan, but Rishabh Pant missed a tough stumping chance.

The post-lunch session saw India scalping 3 wickets after conceding 102 runs. The rate of scoring was high for Bangladesh, primarily due to Mominul's fluency and the stroke-filled cameo from Das.Shakib's dismissal in the first over after lunch was a tragedy for the hosts.

Brief scores: India 19/0 (Shubman Gill 14*) trail Bangladesh 227 (Mominul Haque 84; Umesh Yadav 4-25, R Ashwin 4-71) by 208 runs.