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Indian innings deteriorated rapidly on the second morning of the second cricket Test against West Indies here today and the visitors looked to have wasted a sound platform built yesterday. Resuming at their overnight score of 262 for four, India lost four quick wickets including that of centurion Sachin Tendulkar, to slump to 298 for eight before V V S Laxman and Javagal Srinath put up a small but useful partnership.
Laxman and Srinath added 33 for the unfinished ninth wicket to take the score to 331 for eight when lunch break was taken. Laxman completed his second consecutive half-century and was batting on 61 while Srinath was on 18. India had a disastrous start to the day with Tendulkar being dismissed in the eighth over after adding only four runs to his yesterday’s score of 113.
Tendulkar, who was hardly his usual fluent self yesterday too, was tentative this morning and was caught plumb in front of the wicket by Cameron Cuffy after surviving a strong leg-before appeal only the previous ball. India lost their fifth wicket at 276. Cuffy, who had toiled hard yesterday without any success, struck again in his next over by having debutant wicket-keeper Ajay Ratra caught behind for naught.
Laxman, too, had a shaky start to the day and was beaten outside the off-stump a few times before playing some fine strokes. Laxman produced two beautiful cover driven boundaries in successive overs of Mervyn Dillon and grew in confidence as he started middling the ball well. The only concern was that he was running out of partners.
Harbhajan Singh was also out for naught when he hooked Adam Sanford straight into the hands of Cuffy at fine leg and 11 runs later, Zaheer Khan was back in the pavilion, clean bowled by Sanford for five. Laxman pulled Sanford to the mid-wicket boundary for his eighth four to raise his half-century after having batted for 161 minutes. It also brought up the 300 of the Indian innings.
Srinath rode on his luck and hit two boundaries over the slips, one off Sanford and the other off Marlon Black who had to be taken to hospital yesterday after suffering from dehydration. The Indian duo saw the rest of the session without further trouble.
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