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West Indies made best use of the good batting conditions at St. Kitts to score 207 for the loss of just 1 wicket on the opening day’s play of the 3rd test match. Gayle was the only man to be dismissed; he had scored a bludgeoning 83 which had 5 monstrous sixes. Daren Ganga has got to his 7th test half century and he is on 64 not out. Giving him company is Ramnaresh Sarwan who is on 42. It was a curtailed day with just 64 overs possible due to the rain which visited the ground this morning and yesterday night.
Tale of the Afternoon Session
Early morning showers had got the ground wet enough to delay the start by 150 minutes. It was only after the lunch break that the Test Match got underway. West Indies won the toss and elected to bat first on a pitch that looked like another graveyard for the bowlers. West Indies had got in Marlon Samuels for Ian Bradshaw and the former was selected as an extra batsman to bat at no.7 and he could also bowl his off breaks. India made two changes dropping Irfan Pathan and VRV Singh for Harbhajan Singh and Sreesanth.
It was a cautious start from West Indies with both Gayle and Ganga tied down by the accurate off stump bowling from Munaf and Sreesanth. Gayle broke the shackles with a monstrous six off Sreesanth as he went through the line in his lofted shot. Rain had hit the ground once again after 8 overs of the innings. It was just a passing shower that robbed just 5 overs of the day’s play. With the pacers not able to provide the breakthrough, India brought on its two spinners Kumble and Harbhajan. Gayle took a special liking for Harbhajan and he smacked him for three sixes. Harbhajan was forced to be taken out of the attack after his 6 overs were bludgeoned for 42 runs. West Indies went to the Tea break at 108 for no loss after the end of 31 overs. Gayle was on 69 and Ganga was keeping his wicket intact with good defence and he was on 34 at lunch.
Tale of the Last Session
India opened with Munaf Patel and Kumble after the Tea Break and the fast bowler was getting the ball to reverse swing. Munaf was bowling at brisk speeds often touching 142kmph. He was bowling round the wicket and one delivery he had got it to swing into the left hander Gayle who had made a shocking mistake of shouldering arms to that. The reverse swinging inswinger knocked the offstump making a cracking sound. Gayle’s innings came to an end with his personal score at 83 which had taken him 127 balls. The left hander had missed out on what could have been a big score probably even a double hundred. Such was the flatness of the track. Ramnaresh Sarwan had come in at no.3 ahead of last match centurion Brian Lara. The Guyanese survived few close lbw shouts from Munaf and Kumble. But once he got his eye in, he opened up to play some delightful shots. Ganga was all the time intent on sticking to the wicket and waiting for the real bad ones to pick the runs from. The two batsmen carried on keeping the Indian bowlers at bay and it looks likely that West Indies would head towards a big first innings total. If India cannot get the early wickets tomorrow morning, then they better keep the run rate of the homeside very down to delay the declaration time. Munaf had bowled exceedingly well all day and his figures at the end of the day were 1 for 53 in 14. Kumble kept it very tight although he was bowling the occasional short ones and he had gone for 54 in his 21. He was rather unfortunate in not having some close lbw decisions in his favour. He was troubled by debutant umpire Brian Jerling who moved away from the stumps a bit too soon whenever an appeal was made. Harbhajan was tonked in his 1st spell but he can come back with the Gayle threat gone.
The bowlers need to put in some magical spells on this kind of wicket. May be the bowlers with the 150+kmph speeds could have done something different on this track as they always take the pitch out of the equation.