India Defeated 421 (Jaiswal 171, Rohit 103, Kohli 76) till 5 December west indies 150 (Athanaje 47, Ashwin 5-60, Jadeja 3-26) and 130 (Athanaje 28, Ashwin 7-71, Jadeja 2-38) by an innings and 141 runs
With plenty of turn and bounce for the spinners on the pitch, Rohit Sharma asked Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja to work together after the fourth over of West Indies’ second innings. It didn’t take long for the pair to make an impact and, using angles around the wicket, they demolished the West Indies top order. Ashwin dismissed right-handers Kraigg Brathwaite and Jermaine Blackwood and Jadeja dismissed left-handers Tangerine Chanderpaul and Ramon Reifer. This reduced West Indies’ score to 32 runs for four wickets, despite Ishan Kishan having Brathwaite caught out by Jadeja on zero.
Athanaz and Joshua da Silva took the team past 50 but their score was only 26 runs when Mohammed Siraj trapped da Silva out LBW. Athanaz, dropped by Jaiswal off Ashwin on 1, was trying to stay positive. He hit a few fours in Ashwin’s first spell, but the offspinner had him caught at short leg and Jaiswal made no mistake on this occasion.
Alzarri Joseph came ahead of Rahkeem Cornwall for the second time in the Test and tried to survive through attack. He hit a six off Ashwin over long off, but when he went for another slog it was out to deep midwicket.
For his fifth wicket, Ashwin switched over the wicket and had Cornwall caught at short leg with a big offbreak. Kemar Roach also could not last long and while Jomel Warrican entertained for a short while, it took only a few overs for Ashwin to have him LBW after the stipulated time. Jason Holder resisted for 50 balls but got little help from the other end.
Joseph replaced Holder as soon as he became eligible to bowl. Till then Jaiswal was trying to score runs quickly. He uppercut Joseph to backward point for four runs, before driving Warrican straight down the ground for six runs to complete the 100-run partnership with Kohli.
Joseph then pulled back his length, bowled five consecutive dot balls to Jaiswal and had him caught behind the wicket on the sixth ball as the left-handed batsman tried to punch it on the backfoot.
Ajinkya Rahane failed to account for the slow pace of the pitch and fell to 3 runs out to cover off Roach’s first ball of the morning.
West Indies had a chance to dismiss Kohli in the sixth over of the day when Warrican pushed him up towards extra cover but Brathwaite dropped the catch. Kohli was on 40 runs at that time and he had to work hard to score runs. It took him 147 balls to complete his half-century, which is his third slowest half-century in Test cricket.
Scoring runs became a little easier when, around 25 minutes before lunch, Brathwaite positioned Athanaz at one end and himself at the other. Kohli and Jadeja used that window to hit two fours each and took India past 400.
Soon after lunch, Kohli got another reprieve on 72 runs. Driving away from the body, he edged Roach behind the stumps, and da Silva, despite a one-handed diving effort, could not hold on to the chance. Kohli’s innings eventually ended at 76 when he flicked Cornwall to leg slip.
Like fellow debutant Jaiswal, Kishan also took a long time to open his account. Jaiswal was out on the 16th ball; Kishan did this on the 20th. As soon as Kishan scored his first run, Rohit declared the innings.
Hemant Brar is sub-editor at ESPNcricinfo