India vs New Zealand: Before doomsday comes judgement day

The degree of difficulty becomes greater still in the fourth innings, when chasing an improbable target. Everything and everyone is out to get you, including the crowd who amplify their team’s appeals, which are made almost every ball, to insane decibel levels. It can sometime even get to the nerves of the only two people who aren’t against you: the umpires. A win is out of question, the Test mach becomes a battle of survival.

New Zealand found them in this situation on Sunday afternoon when India declared at a whopping 377 for five in the second innings, setting a target of 434 runs. Not that the records mean anything in the context of this game, but for those who still insist, the highest successful chase in the 139-year history of Test cricket is 418, by the West Indies. The highest chase in India in 84 years is 387, by India.

New Zealand wouldn’t have bothered themselves with these meaningless numbers. Their target would have been to escape from the last session with minimal damage. Theoretically, if India could bat with abandon earlier in the day, so could they. The Blackcaps needed to ignore the fact that the inadequacies of their own spin resources contributed to India’s total in the second innings. You have to clutch at straws when you are facing Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja in their territory.

Ashwin magic

It was the second over the innings. Ashwin came from around the wicket to bowl at the left-handed Latham. The first ball drifted in, as the new ball sometimes does. But it also turned significantly, which you don’t expect from a shiny hard ball.

There are two ways out when you are in such a pickle. One, you summon your inner steel and fight it out or die trying. Two, you just give up and die — perhaps wanting the ordeal to end as quickly as possible. Latham fell trying to fight it out. Martin Guptill self-destructed.

In the last couple of years, Guptill has emerged as one of the most explosive and impactful batsmen in limited overs cricket. But aside of his 156 in Dunedin against Sri Lanka in December 2015, the opener hasn’t done anything of note in the last one year in the five-day format. He came into this Test match on the back of a poor South Africa series and his place in the XI came under pressure after 15 and 0 in the warm-up match in Delhi. His 21 in the first innings at Kanpur was edgy.

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It was against this background the prepared to face Ashwin. A fuller ball outside off and Guptill went down on one knee to sweep it. He inside-edged it onto his shoe and the rebound was caught at silly point. Four balls later, Ashwin trapped Latham the way he had got him on Day Three. He tossed up what looked like an off break, and Latham came forward trying to play for the turn. It went straight and caught him plumb in front.

Kane Williamson tried to settle some nerves, but became the landmark 200th Test scalp for Ashwin when the New Zealand captain went back to play the off-spinner but was beaten by a devilishly turning ball. As the umpire’s finger went up in response to the lbw appeal, Ashwin was swamped by his teammates. Two hundred wickets in 37 matches. Come to think of it: only one bowler has reached there at a better clip, the Australian Clarence Victor Grimmett, and he did so nearly a century ago. Ashwin might have possibly been there faster had the final Test in the West Indies not been rained out.

“Maybe Clarrie Grimmett was a nicer man than I am,” Ashwin remarked at the press conference. “I think it just had to be that way I guess. It’s fine, honestly. There are a lot of positives to look at and lots of good memories that I’ve created over the last five-six years of international cricket, and to look back and feel sore about it is not the right way to go about my career I feel. So I’m just happy where I am right now.”

Some of the giants on whose shoulders the tall offie now stands include Dennis Lillee, Waqar Younis, Dale Steyn, Malcolm Marshall, Shane Warne and Muttiah Muralitharan. And what is almost scary is what’s in store. With India set to play 12 more matches at home in the next months, it’s possible he may well be in sight of the 300 mark by March.

Ashwin is not thinking that far, though. “Everybody keeps talking about 13 Test matches in the season for me, but as far as I’m concerned it’s one day at a time. Try and probably close out the Test match tomorrow, take a 1-0 lead and then take it forward from there.”

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Ross Taylor helped that cause by throwing his wicket away. His was a hare-brained runout — the bat hanging in the air even though it was comfortably past the line. New Zealand were four wicket down for 56.

Rohit unburdened

The contrast was highlighted by the fact that India had lost their fourth wicket at 228. The home team lost Murali Vijay early on Sunday, and it seemed there would be a repeat of the first innings where the breaking of the second wicket partnership led to a flurry of wickets. India lost Virat Kohli and Cheteshwar Pujara in the space of 14 runs, however a couple of dropped catches allowed Ajinkya Rahane and Rohit Sharma to pull away.

With little pressure on back as India were comfortably ahead, and the liberty to bat till tea, Rohit’s batting was unencumbered. The drives were flowing and the lofted shots were going in vacant spaces and not in the hands of fielders. He made and unbeaten 68 and Jadeja brought up his fifty, too, when Virat Kohli decided to declare and put a deflated New Zealand on the mat.

Through Ashwin’s record book

1st wicket (1st Test, Feroz Shah Kotla, 2011): West Indies batsman Darren Bravo was Ravichandran Ashwin’s first Test wicket. Ashwin was bowling from around the wicket, and the left-hander tried to cut but for the ball to skid straight off the surface and hit the stumps. He went on to pick nine wickets in the match and was adjudged man of the match.

50th wicket (9th Test, Ahmedabad, 2012): Another bowled. This one was more classical in rendition, as it spun wickedly from outside the off-stump to sneak through the huge gap between England opener Nick Compton’s bat and pad. He was the fastest Indian but the 18th quickest overall to this mark.

100th wicket (18th Test, Mumbai, 2014): West Indies skipper Darren Sammy literally gifted him the wicket, as he attempted an agricultural slog across the line to give Rohit Sharma a simple catch in the ring. He was yet again the fastest Indian and the fifth fastest in the world to accomplish the milestone. He took seven wickets in the match, which was Sachin Tendulkar’s farewell Test.

150th wicket (29th Test, Mohali, 2015): A typical Ashwin dismissal in the subcontinent as he made one turn and bounce on good length, procuring an inside edge off South Africa’s Imran Tahir onto his pads, which was swallowed by Cheteshwar Pujara at short-leg. He became the fastest Indian and the eighth quickest in the world to the feat. He picked eight in the match on perhaps the most spinner-friendly surface dished out in Mohali.

200th wicket (37th Test, Kanpur, 2016): Ashwin certainly thought he had his 200th scalp when a delivery turned viciously and kept mind-bogglingly low to ping Kane Williamson in front. But the umpire reckoned it was heading down the leg. But a few overs later, he had Williamson adjacent with a quick, sharp off-break, thus becoming the second fastest to take 200 wickets in Tests, one more than it took for leg-spinner Clarrie Grimmet.