Rohit Sharma smashes unbeaten 80 in India's 106/3 at lunch on Day 1
Chennai: Rohit Sharma scored a sparkling 80 not out while Moeen Ali removed skipper Virat Kohli with a superb delivery as India reached 106 for three against England at lunch during a shared opening session on the first day of the second Test here on Saturday.
At lunch, vice-captain Ajinkya Rahane was batting on 5 while Rohit, who has so far faced 78 balls, hit 13 fours and 1 six in his delightful knock.
For England, Moeen (1/32), Olly Stone (1/14) and Jack Leach (1/23) picked up a wicket each.
Mooen struck a huge blow when he got one to dip and turn in sharply as Kohli going for a cover drive was bowled through the gate.
Rohit's innings was laced with some lovely drives and a six. He added 85 runs for the second wicket with Pujara (21, 58 balls, 2 fours) and appeared to be steering India to a good position before the spinners struck.
First, Jack Leach (1/23) tossed one up to get Pujara edge one to Ben Stokes at slip before Moeen (1/32 in 6 overs) scalped the prize wicket of Kohli.
The home side, batting first after Kohli won the toss and batted, suffered an early jolt when the pacy Olly Stone, playing his second Test, dismissed Shubman Gill for a duck.
Gill shouldered arms to a delivery that came in and was rapped on the front pad, to give England a great start.
India made three changes to their playing XI with left-arm spin bowling all-rounder Axar Patel making his debut while pacer Jasprit Bumrah was rested.
In-form Mohammed Siraj returned to the playing XI along with left-arm wrist spinner Kuldeep Yadav, who replaced Washington Sundar to play his first game in two years.
For England, Moeen Ali came in place of Dom Bess, Stuart Broad replaced James Anderson while injured Jofra Archer made way for Olly Stone. Ben Foakes replaced Jos Buttler as the wicketkeeper.
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Two injuries, one DNF, a DQ as India end messy World Relays campaign
Gaborone (Botswana) (PTI): Amoj Jacob and Ragul Kumar got injured during the men's 4x400m and 4x100 races respectively as India ended their World Athletics Relays campaign in disappointment on the second day of competitions here on Sunday.
The Indian camp had high hopes of making the 2027 World Championships in the men's 4x400m relay but the team did not finish (DNF) the race as Jacob suffered cramps and pulled out of the race after taking the baton from the first leg runner Dharamveer Choudhary. Rajesh Ramesh and Vishal TK were to run in the third and fourth legs.
Those teams which could not qualify for the 2027 Beijing World Championships by reaching the final round of each of the six relay events on Saturday were given another chance in the second qualification round on Sunday.
The top two teams in each of the two heats (in all six relay events) booked the Beijing ticket on Sunday.
India will now have to try and qualify for the World Championships through the Top Lists of the World Athletics, which is a long and tedious process.
In the men's 4x100m race, third leg runner Ragul Kumar fell down the track after failing to hand over the baton inside the exchange zone to fourth leg runner Gurindervir Singh, which clearly showed the lack of coordination among the runners.
Harsh Santosh Raut and Animesh Kujur ran the first two legs.
The Indian quartet was disqualified and Kumar was seen being taken away from the Field of Play with the help of the volunteers.
It was a comedy of errors in the case of the women's 4x100m race, which saw the baton being dropped during an exchange between first leg runner Tamanna and second runner Nithya Gandhe, though the Indians finished the race in 53.09 seconds.
Gandhe started running quite a distance, but after realising that the baton was not in her hand, she turned and ran back to pick it up.
The only silver-lining for the Indian contingent was the national record time in the mixed 4x100m relay race, though the quartet of Ragul Kumar, Nithya Gandhe, Animesh Kujur and Sneha SS finished sixth in heat number two with a time of 41.35 seconds, bettering the previous national mark of 42.30 seconds set in March in Chandigarh.
The mixed 4x400m relay quartet of Theerthesh P Shetty, Kumari Saloni, Nihal William and Rashdeep Kaur ended at fifth in heat number one with a time of 3 minutes and 19.40 seconds.
On Saturday, all the five Indian relay teams had failed to make it to the respective final rounds and thus missed out on the 2027 World Championships berths.
