India vs Windies: Suresh Raina showers praises on India’s three centurions

After a disappointing five-Test series in England, India were back to their strong self in the first Test against the Windies at home and unless miracle strikes, Virat Kohli’s men shouldn’t have much problem to win the two-game series 2-0. The first Test in Rajkot tilted to India’s favour inside two days as the visitors’ batting fumbled in response to the hosts’ massive first innings score.

The Windies were 94 for 6 at stumps on Day 2 after India declared their innings at 649 for 9. They still need 556 runs to make India bat again while another 356 runs to avoid follow-on. It was indeed difficult to believe the way the visitors batted after their Indian counterparts’ use of the wicket.

As many as three Indian batsmen slammed centuries when India batted, with two coming on the second day. After youngster Prithvi Shaw hit 134 off 154 balls on Day 1 to become the youngest Indian batsman to hit a debut Test ton, Kohli registered his 24th Test hundred (139 off 230 balls) while Ravindra Jadeja scored his first Test ton (100 not out off 132 balls) on Day 2 to take India to a mammoth total.

India’s Test discard Suresh Raina hailed the Indian team for its dominating show and he particularly showered praise on the three centurions, calling their knocks “terrific”.

What terrific knocks today, You guys took the game to another level! Keep going, keep shining! @imVkohli @imjadeja @RishabPant777 #INDvsWI #TeamIndia

— Suresh Raina (@ImRaina) October 5, 2018

Pant and Pujara missed their tons

The number of century-makers in the Indian innings could have been even more had Rishabh Pant (92) and Cheteshwar Pujara (86) not fallen short of the three-figure mark by a close margin.

Raina, a dashing left-hand middle-order batsman, has played 18 Tests for India between 2010 and 2015 but could score only 768 runs at an ordinary average of 26.48 with just one hundred. He has been more effective in the ODIs in which he has scored 5,615 runs in 226 matches at an average of 35-plus.

India will play Windies in the second Test in Hyderabad from October 12.

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