SL v IND, 2nd Test, Day 2: CT Player of the day – Ravichandran Ashwin

On a day when India tightened the screws over hosts Sri Lanka, Ravichandran Ashwin rose to the fore with an all-round performance. Sri Lanka finished the day trailing by 572 runs with 8 first innings wicket in hand. Playing in his 51st Test for India, Ashwin chipped in with a fine knock of 54 and then opened the bowling with the new ball to send both openers back in the hut early.

Ashwin proves worth at No. 6

Hero of Day 1, Chestashwar Pujara could add just 5 runs to his overnight score before he fell to Karunaratne for 133. In walked Ashwin, who took guard at No. 6. Last year, the Indian think tank decided to give Ashwin a go at No. 6 and he responded immediately by scoring two hundreds in the West Indies series. He followed it up by scoring four half centuries in the England home series and looked at home batting in the middle order.

Since then, however, Ashwin struggled with the bat as he went on register 5 scores of single digit in his next 7 knocks. He started with a solid 47 against Sri Lanka in the first Test and made a calm 54 in Colombo. He faced 92 balls while doing that, picking 5 fours and a six during his innings. The 30-year old added 63 runs for the fifth wicket with Rahane (132) and followed it up with another decent partnership of 38 with Saha before he was castled by the craft of senior spinner Rangana Herath.

During the course of his innings, Ashwin completed 2,000 Test runs for India. He has done that at an average of 32.85 and joins Kapil Dev, Harbhajan Singh and Anil Kumble to become the only fourth player from India to complete a double of 2,000 runs and 200 wickets. Amongst the list, he has the best batting as well as bowling average which speak volumes about the class and quality of Ashwin.

A bright innings of 70* from 85 balls from Ravindra Jadeja helped India to post 622 runs on the board before Kohli decided to declare. He was in search of a couple of wickets before stumps to put Sri Lanka under tremendous pressure.

Off-spinner makes early inroads for India

Ashwin was up to the challenge, and struck in his very first over, though off a fairly average delivery. Seeing two left-handers open the innings: Dimuth Karunaratne and Upul Tharanga, Kohli threw the new ball to Ashwin, not an irregular sight in Tests played in the sub-continent. Ashwin bowled a non-spinning back of the length delivery to Tharanga, who wanted to whip it on the leg side because of the angle but failed to keep it down as KL Rahul grabbed a blinder at short leg.

His next victim was 29-year old Karunaratne, who worked hard to reach 25 but made the mistake of prodding a length delivery with an angled bat. Ashwin had given the ball a fair bit of revolutions and the ball drifted in and turned to catch the outside edge of the opener which was smartly taken by Rahane at first slip. Kusal Mendis and skipper Chandimal took Sri Lanka to stumps without further damage as the hosts ended the day at 50 for 2 after 20 overs. Ashwin returned with 2/38 and looked good to pick a few more on Day 3.