Tardy Tigers left crawling

Bangladesh were left with the difficult task of overtaking a sizeable deficit on a tricky pitch on the third day as their sloppiness in the field on the second day allowed India to score 314 in their first innings and get an 87-run lead in their hands.

In the six overs they had to bat, Bangladesh openers Najmul Hossain Shanto and Zakir Hasan was cautious as they managed to save their wicket and get seven runs.

The first session of the day belonged to Bangladesh as Taijul Islam picked up three of his four wickets in this period, dismissing KL Rahul, Shubhman Gill, and Cheteshwar Pujara.

And when Taskin Ahmed sent Virat Kohli back early after Lunch, it seemed like Bangladesh, despite their modest making of 227, would get the upper hand after both teams ended their first try with the bat.

But that did not happen as Bangladesh went down their slippery slope, quite literally.

Rishabh Pant and Shreyas Iyer, who scored 93 and 86 respectively, handed out chances in the early minutes of their innings, but the Tigers failed, or simply refused, to take them.

Pant, on 11, gave a chance off Mehidy Hasan Miraz’s bowling to Liton Das at slip, but he failed to grasp it. Miraz was unlucky once again when Pant was on 59 as the left-handed batter tried to clear the ropes at long-on, and Mushfiqur Rahim could have taken a couple of steps back to make an attempt but decided to jump early and parry the ball to achieve Pant’s goal. Pant finally fell to Miraz, but by then had scored 93.

Miraz himself almost pulled off a blinder to get rid of Iyer off Taskin’s bowling, but spilt it and injured himself in the process to give the Indian batter a let-off when he was on 19.

Two runs later, Bangladesh wicketkeeper Nurul Hasan Sohan did Iyer the biggest favour as he spurned a regulation stumping to give the Indian batter an opportunity, something he took with both hands.

Bangladesh skipper Shakib Al Hasan, who took four wickets, had deceived Iyer completely with the turn, leaving the batter in the middle of nowhere outside his crease. But Nurul could not keep the ball within his gloves even with two attempts, and Iyer scored 65 more runs.

Iyer, like Pant, fell to the same bowler off whose bowling they survived as he was trapped LBW trying a sweep by Shakib.

After the day’s play, Taijul, who had defended the fielding after the first Test in Chattogram where the Tigers had pulled a similar rabbit out of their sloppy hat, accepted that they were handing the opponent opportunities.

“We do have some lackings. Big teams do not dish out these opportunities, which we do. We will try to cover this up soon,” he said in a press conference on Friday.

Taijul added they would have been in a better position if not for the spurned chances, “We had 2-3 chances. If we could have taken them, we could have had a lead by bowling them out early. It’s very important to do so.”

The left-arm spinner hoped of batting for long, something Bangladesh must do to save the series, so they can put India into batting when the pitch will be at its worst for batting.

“If we can bat tomorrow and into the next day, it will be great. The wicket is currently in such a state that as long as we can bat, the better. Because then we can make them bat later,” the left-arm spinner said.