The pitch at Sabina Park was lush green in the build-up to this Test match. Forty eight hours before the match started, it was tough to segregate it from the adjacent practice wickets. Twenty four hours out, the two captains ascertained there was some moisture in the pitch. On Day 1 of this second Test, the pitch wasn’t as green as it had been previously, yet its dampness played on the Indian skipper’s mind.
“We would have bowled first,” said Virat Kohli, even as Jason Holder won the toss and opted to bat. The year 1998 was the last time a Test was drawn at this ground, and India won their last two matches here, in 2006 and 2011, going on to win the series under Rahul Dravid and MS Dhoni, respectively. Given the gulf between the present sides, then, it is but a formality that India will win the series again. Only the margin is in question.
The answer was quickly forthcoming, as Ishant Sharma found his line and length rightaway. The tall pacer often misreads conditions, belying his immense experience, and taking far too long to make the necessary adjustments. On Saturday, he was on the mark from the word go, and soon enough West Indies were struggling at 7/3, with the new ball swinging and bouncing.
But this is cricket in the Caribbean, and there is a lot of pride at stake even when the result is a foregone conclusion. At that stage, two Jamaicans came together in front of a sparse, yet loud home crowd, and thus started a fight back. Mind you, this wasn’t your typical Test cricket. The batting side was on the back foot, but the batsmen weren’t prodding around and playing for time with stoic defence. No, Jermaine Blackwood and Marlon Samuels came out all guns blazing.
Punching above their weight
The pair added 81 runs, staying together for just 20.2 overs, but it wasn’t the speed of scoring that was surprising here. It was the sheer audacity of their strokes, and of their intent, that shone through the situation they were in. They took risks, probably none of them calculated ones, and if this ploy hadn’t worked, they would have been bowled out for less than 100 runs. For a little while though, the West Indies punched above their weight and pushed India onto the back foot for the first time in this series.
Samuels egged on his partner, and Blackwood did the rest. Smack flew a six, the first of the Test, off Ishant in the 11th over. Then, three overs later, another one off R Ashwin. Umesh Yadav and Amit Mishra weren’t spared either as the duo hit five sixes during their fourth-wicket partnership. Blackwood alone accounted for four of them, as he sped to a 47-ball fifty and finished with a run-a-ball 62.
“You cannot keep losing wickets and not score runs. I just the took the opportunities that came my way and scored some runs. That’s how I bat, it was just my natural game,” he said afterwards.
For a brief period, India’s frustrations were clearly visible. The two spinners had been brought on within 17 overs of play, and both had been hit out of the park for disdainful sixes. Mishra had responded with a couple of floated deliveries that beat Blackwood, but the finger didn’t go up. The bowler glared at the umpire, exchanged words with the batsman, and the situation grew volatile – perhaps the best passage of play in five days of Test cricket on this tour.
A boxing bout
It was not unlike a boxing bout, like the one in that movie Real Steel. Like the robots’ "global champion" Zeus fighting against the weakling Atom, India got big on the West Indies, cornering them with a huge score in Antigua. Then, the punches flew in from every direction, and reduced them to near pulp.
It continued this morning, in the second round, and just when the visitors stepped back for a breather, the fightback began. Like Atom fighting off Zeus and stunning him with a flurry of hooks and uppercuts, Blackwood and Samuels punched right back, catching India unaware, and leaving them gasping for breath. The referee’s bell had saved the champion robot in the movie, but there are no such interventions in Test cricket.
With the break approaching, almost as a last throw of the dice, Kohli threw the ball to Ashwin again after Blackwood had hit him out of action over a two-over spell. This time the wily off-spinner used a sharp dip and variation in pace to fool the batsmen, giving away only one run off 12 deliveries bowled before lunch. More importantly, he got Blackwood leg before, the batsman trapped as he looked to drive one that dipped sharply.
“I was really taken aback by the counter-attack that Blackwood did. It sort of put the game in the balance. The experienced side is seizing more opportune moments. With a little more experience, the game could have been closer,” said Ashwin after the day’s play, after finishing with 5/52, his 18th five-wicket haul in just 34 Tests.
His words did ring true as, once that partnership was broken, the hosts’ batting collapsed resumed after lunch, and they were bowled out for 196. It was the same old story, with the champion prevailing in the end. India will, too, as KL Rahul helped them finish the day just 70 runs behind at stumps.
Could this script have been different had the two batsmen shut shop and played for the break? That is conjecture. And so, this small fightback will be a resonance of not only what the West Indies were once gloriously capable of, but also of their constant struggle to string together such finite moments with consistency.
