Seasoned off-spinner Ravichandran Ashwin sparkled on home turf with his sixth Test hundred as he combined with Ravindra Jadeja to steer India out of trouble and post a formidable 339 for six on day one of the first Test against Bangladesh here on Thursday.
Ashwin (102 batting) and Jadeja (86 batting) added 195 runs (174 minutes, 225 balls) for a riveting unbroken seventh wicket stand after young pacer Hasan Mahmud (4/58) reduced India to 144 for six, despite Yashasvi Jaiswal making a solid 56.
The ebb and flow of the day’s proceedings was quite remarkable and mostly revolved around Ashwin, Jadeja and Mahmud, who made his Test debut in March this year and was just three games old in the format before this match.
In a stunning first spell of 5-2-6-3, the 24-year-old Mahmud accounted for the cream of Indian top-order -- Rohit Sharma (6), Shubman Gill (0) and Virat Kohli (6) -- before snapping Rishabh Pant’s return to Test cricket (39 off 52 balls) in the initial moments of the second session.
KL Rahul, another Indian batter who is re-entering the Indian Test establishment, fell for 16 to off-spinner Mehidy Hasan Miraz as fortune’s pendulum stayed firmly in Bangladesh’s quarter.
But then came the two gladiators who know Chepauk like the back of their hand -- Ashwin by birth and Jadeja through his long association with the Chennai Super Kings.
One more wicket at that stage would have extended the dominance of Bangladesh, but such thoughts hardly disturbed Ashwin and Jadeja.
Ashwin went off the blocks with a flurry of boundaries, a firm validation of his oh-so-smooth timing born out of fluent hand movement through shots and precise footwork.
There was this ramp shot off Mahmud, who tried to rattle Ashwin with a short-pitched delivery that climbed onto his body.
But the veteran player arched himself back ever so slightly to gain space to execute the ramp over the slip -- fabulous in conceptualisation and execution.
At times, he scored at a strike rate in excess of 100 and was not hesitant to travel the more uncultured way. A slog sweep that went for six over mid-wicket off left-arm spinner Shakib Al-Hasan testified that.
Jadeja was a tad different in his approach. Sensing that Ashwin was in good touch, the left-hander had the simple job of keeping his end going and he did that with minimum fuss.
A past master in operating from behind the giant shadows of superstars, Jadeja looked extremely comfortable doing that once more, providing the assurance Ashwin needed.
But there were moments, the showman in Jadeja came forth and Shakib was the aggrieved party, getting hammered for three fours.
Bangladesh’s star of the day Mahmud, too was not spared as Jadeja, who raised his fifty off 73 balls, played a drag-pull off the pacer to send him for a six.
Other times, he wing-heeled across the pitch for those ones and twos to keep the Bangladesh bowlers frustrated.
The spectators eventually witnessed the moment that they had been waiting for when Ashwin reached the hundred with a single off Shakib, and they welcomed it with applause, cheers and loud bugling. It was his second consecutive hundred at his home ground after going past the three-figure mark here against England in 2021. And it could not have come at a better time as well.
But before the epic fightback, the Indian innings resembled a crumbling rampart. It’s not often that a team winning the toss would elect to bowl first here as that translates into a fourth-innings chase.
But Bangladesh skipper Najmul Hossain Shanto bit the bullet while going against the trend, and was rewarded for it too. Rohit, who was saved by DRS when he was on 1, was the first to depart.
The Indian skipper had little choice other than playing a wobble seam delivery that came at him on a tight angle as he edged to Shanto at second slip.
Gill lasted just eight balls but he would count himself unlucky, feathering Mahumd’s down the leg side delivery to stumper Litton Das.
Kohli walked into the Chepauk amid loud cheers and looked confident. But an old failing resurfaced to haunt him.
Mahmud pitched one just short of the length outside the off-stump, and the length was not suitable for a drive.
But the star batter chose to play an expansive one with the ball nestling in Litton’s gloves after taking a healthy edge off his bat.
Jaiswal and Pant added 62 runs for the fourth wicket to temporarily check the free fall before both perished in close succession in the middle session.
Bangladesh might have thought the effort was good enough to keep the home side flat on the ropes, but Ashwin and Jadeja made them wiser as to why it is so tough to keep India on the back-foot at home for long.
