Mohammed Siraj took a stunning catch to send West Indies batter Jermaine Blackwood back to the dressing room. The batter went after Ravindra Jadeja but mistimed his shot. The ball went high, and Siraj had to dive to complete a one-handed grab.
Even though the wicket of Blackwood will be reflected in the account of Jadeja for posterity, truth be told, the catch taken by Mohammed Siraj was perhaps the reason why Jadeja could get his man.
It was Windies’ fourth wicket in the first session of the opening game.
West Indies are taking on India in the first Test of the two-match series at the Windsor Park in Dominica. West Indies skipper Kraigg Brathwaite won the toss and elected to bat first. However, the home team did not have a good first session at all as they lost four wickets for 68 runs, with three of them falling to spinners. While Ravichandran Ashwin picked two of the four wickets that fell in the first session, his spin-bowling partner Ravindra Jadeja removed Jermaine Blackwood off the last before before the lunch break.
Even though the wicket of Blackwood will be reflected in the account of Jadeja for posterity, truth be told, the catch taken by Mohammed Siraj was perhaps the reason why Jadeja could get his man. The ball seemed to be going away from the fielder but the fast bowler produced an acrobatic effort in the field to complete a stunner and send back Blackwood back in the pavilion.
The hosts were 68/4 at lunch, with R Ashwin taking two wickets. Shardul Thakur and Jadeja took one wicket each for the Rohit Sharma-led team.
Ashwin undid Tagenarine Chanderpaul and Kraigg Brathwaite, while Raymon Reifer gave his wicket to Thakur.
Earlier, it was Ashwin who gave India the early breakthroughs and got rid of both the openers. The way he got rid of the left-hander Tagenarine Chanderpaul was a sight to behold as he delivered a fantastic ball which angled into the left-handed before turning away from him just about enough to beat him and hit the stumps.
He later got rid of the other opener, Windies skipper Brathwaite who failed to get a desired connection on the ballm trying to go for a big hit as the ball went miles in the air but did not even clear the 30-yard circle with Rohit Sharma taking a safe catch at covers. Shardul Thakur was the other wicket-taker in the first session for the visitors who dismissed Raymon Reifer in his first over.
Spinners did play an instrumental role in the first session as was expected after both teams decided to field two specialist spinners in their XIs.