Cricket

Shreyas Iyer scores a well fought hundred in his maiden Test match

By Vaibhaw Tiwari

The former Delhi Capitals skipper Shreyas Iyer brings up a well-fought 100 in his first test against New Zealand. The right-hander from Mumbai was allowed to make his Test debut for India in the absence of players like Kohli, Rohit, and KL Rahul, and he was too good to let the opportunity pass.

On the first day of play, Iyer came in to bat when India found itself in trouble. In the post-lunch session, New Zealand made a comeback to the game after India bossing the first session. They picked two prized wickets of Shubman Gill, who was batting on 52, and then removed Cheteshwar Pujara soon enough to worry everyone. This wicket brought Shreyas Iyer to the crease, and he did not look comfortable at all during the start of his inning. He was drawn to play a wild shot to get himself off the mark, but after that, he got a proper cricketing shot away to the fences, which eased some nerves.

From there onwards, he played some confident cricket and decided to build the inning with the interim captain Ajinkya Rahane. New Zealand, however, did not allow the partnership to blossom and made sure that Rahane was sent back to the pavilion before he could mark an irreparable dent to the bowling lineup. The fourth wicket brought Ravindra Jadeja to the crease, and Iyer decided to play as the predominant run-scorer while Jadeja hung around supporting him. Together the duo negotiated the second session and decided to take on the bowlers in the third session of the day. Both the batters scored their fifties in the final session of the day and helped India score 258 without losing any more wickets.

The morning session was another tricky session where the Kiwi seamers dominated yet again. Tim Southee even managed to break the partnership by removing Jadeja at his overnight score of 50. Iyer looked more settled than Jadeja, though, and decided to deal in boundaries instead. He scored 5 fours in no time to cruise to the score of 96.

In the 92nd over, while batting at 98, Iyer pushed to one ball outside off to take it past the point fielder to bring up his maiden test century in 157 balls. His inning included 12 fours and 1 sixer as well.

Tags: India vs New Zealand Kyle Jamieson Ravindra Jadeja Shreyas Iyer Tim Southee

Vaibhaw Tiwari

Vaibhaw Tiwari is a postgraduate in English. A media enthusiast who has a stronghold on communication and content writing. Vaibhaw is currently working as a subeditor at Daily India News and can be reached at [email protected]