Akshar Patel gives India control of Kanpur Test against New Zealand

Akshar Patel-led Indian bowling attack ran through a resolute New Zealand batting lineup as the hosts took complete control of the ongoing first Test of the two-match series, being played at the Green Park stadium in Kanpur, on Saturday. 

Having started the day with New Zealand at a firm footing of 129/0 in reply to India's first-innings score of 345, the visitors were indeed in the driver’s seat. But two sessions later, the game had turned completely in the favour of the Indian team with Akshar claiming his fifth five-wicket haul in only his fourth Test while sparking a collapse in the New Zealand ranks. 

New Zealand stuttered from 129/0 296 all out with Akshar returning with figures of 5/62 from his 34 overs, in the rich company of Ravichandran Ashwin, who claimed 3/82 from his 42.3 overs. 

The Indian bowlers had to work incredibly hard on the second day of the Kanpur Test when New Zealand batted for 57 overs at a stretch without any damage, but on the third, usually the decisive day of any Test, the Indians finally came to the party on the back of a high-quality spin bowling. 

Also among the highlight was an impressive performance by the stand in wicketkeeper KS Bharat, who kept wickets in place of Wriddhiman Saha as the senior player sat out due to stiffness in his neck.

Both New Zealand batsman Tom Latham and Will Young looked set for their respective centuries but they were denied triple figure marks by Ashwin and Patel. Ashwin got India the first breakthrough in the first session when he had Young caught behind by Bharath for 89. 

Later on, Patel enticed Latham with a delivery that was a bowled way outside the off-stump. Latham danced down the wicket only to get an inside edge, which was collected sharply on one bounce by Bharath, who ran the batsman out when he was five runs short of his first Test century in India.

India collected two wickets in the first session but it was in the second that they actually put the New Zealand batting to the sword. The experienced Ross Taylor was bamboozled by Akshar when he spun a delivery away from the batsman, which kissed the edge of his bat and landed in the safe hands of Bharat. 

Henry Nicholls was trapped leg-before for only 2, and even though Tom Blundell decided to go the Latham way, he was not successful. The New Zealand wicketkeeper-batsmn faced as many as 94 deliveries to provide strong resistance, but he could not find an answer to a delivery from Akshar which kept shockingly low and crashed into his wickets.

With New Zealand under tremendous pressure, all eyes were trained on their star all-rounder Kyle Jamieson who has had tremendous time against India. Jamison did well to get off to a strong start, but he could not resist hitting one in the air when Ashwin tossed one. Jamieson was caught by Patel comfortably at deep midwicket for 23 from 75 balls.

While Akshar was rewarded racially for his tactics of bowling at the stumps persistently, Ashwin tried almost every trick in his book of spin bowling which asked some really tough questions to the Kiwi batsmen.

While Ishant Sharma remained wicketless, Umesh Yadav was rewarded for being persistent against the New Zealand captain Kane Williamson (18). Yadav got a delivery to nip back into the Kiwi captain, who missed the line of the ball completely as it went on to hit his back leg in front of the wickets.

New Zealand lost all of their 10 wickets for a total of 167 runs, in which the last nine fell for a grand total of 99. At one stage, New Zealand were looking set to take a big lead in the first innings, but sometime after the tea break, they folded for 296 to hand India a vital 49-run lead with two full days’ play left.

India hoped to make a strong start in the second innings but Jamieson is coming across as a player who would continue to harm the opponent irrespective of pitches and conditions. On a wicket where spinners have generally flourished, Jamieson bowled a delivery to Shubman Gill which resembled with any unplayable ball delivered on a pitch which supports fast bowlers.

On the very first delivery of his spell in the second innings, Jamieson found a wide gap between the bat and pads of India opener Shubman Gill as a ball crashed into the top of the off stump. Gill, who scored a half-century in the first innings, was dismissed for one. By the end of the play on the third day in which the Indians had to face five overs, they were placed at 14/1 with an overall lead of 63 runs in the contest. Mayank Agarwal was batting on 4 in the company of the experienced Cheteshwar Pujara, who had struck two boundaries to reach 9 not out.