1st Test: O'Rourke picks three as NZ gain upper hand by reducing India to 34/6

Bengaluru, Oct 17 (IANS) Playing in his first Test match in India, pacer William O’Rourke picked three wickets as a bang-on New Zealand fast-bowling line-up reduced India to 34/6 in 23.5 overs at lunch on day two’s play in first Test at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium on Thursday.

Captain Rohit Sharma won the toss and elected to bat first under overcast skies after day one was lost to rain in Bengaluru. India made two changes from the side who beat Bangladesh at Kanpur earlier this month – Sarfaraz Khan replaced Shubman Gill, who had neck stiffness, while left-arm wrist spinner Kuldeep Yadav came in place of pacer Akash Deep.

In favourable conditions, New Zealand’s three seamers were at their best to trouble the Indian batters with swing and seam. After rain interruption of 35 minutes, the visitors’ bowlers used back of the length balls well to maintain pressure and leave India in trouble.

O'Rourke was impressive in gaining awkward bounce and mixing lengths well to get the better of Indian batters and have figures of 3-13 while Matt Henry took two wickets and Tim Southee picked one scalp. India would have lost their seventh wicket if Tom Blundell hadn’t dropped Rishabh Pant’s catch on seven.

Pant is now unbeaten on 15, but sees an uphill task of taking India to a respectable total in challenging conditions and circumstances. Yashasvi Jaiswal managed to survive despite being beaten multiple times by the pacers. But the same didn’t happen from the other end.

Captain Rohit Sharma was far from his fluent best and even survived an lbw appeal on umpire’s call off Matt Henry. But in a bid to step out against a masterly Tim Southee, Rohit was castled through the gate while going for a big drive against the inswinger.

Virat Kohli’s surprising promotion to number three earned him vociferous chants from the sparse crowd at his adopted home ground. But it was brought to a quick end when O’Rourke got extra bounce on a nip-backer which Kohli looked to defend, but it took the glove edge to forward leaping Glenn Phillips at leg-gully, as he departed for a nine-ball duck.

More trouble followed India as Sarfaraz tried to counterattack with a forceful lofted drive, but ended up mis-hitting off Henry to Devon Conway at mid-off, who stuck out his right hand and took a stunning catch. Pant was a curious mix of caution and aggressiveness, including trying to reverse-sweep off Henry, before rain brought a halt to the proceedings.

After play resumed at 11:05am, Pant and Jaiswal got a boundary each to try and rebuild India’s innings. But O’Rourke struck again as Jaiswal went hard on the cut and was caught brilliantly by backward point diving low to his left.

One brought two for the pacer as he strangled KL Rahul down leg for a six-ball duck, and was followed by Ravindra Jadeja being bizarrely too early into the flick and gave a high leading edge to backward point off Henry as New Zealand walked off the field as the happier side at lunch.

Brief Scores: India 34/6 in 23.5 overs (Rishabh Pant 15 not out; William O’Rourke 3-13) against New Zealand