India vs New Zealand 2024/25, IND vs NZ 2nd Test Match Report, October 24 – 28, 2024

New Zealand 259 lead India 156 (Jadeja 38, Santner 7-53, Phillips 2-26) by 103 runs

However, on a pitch where the ball turned quickly and remained upright at times, Santner kept attacking the stumps and creating enough opportunities. Jadeja was caught back to a full ball and caught lbw. Santner’s slow change was too good for Akash Deep after the number 10 hit a six. A straighter called Jasprit Bumrah as Washington Sundar took India past 150 by attacking Ajaz.

Earlier in the day, Santner and Phillips used a vice grip on batting and took six early wickets to reduce India to 107 for 7.

From the first kick-off, the threat of the pitch was writ large. Three balls from Santner behaved differently at the same ground: one swerved lower than expected, one went in to almost get Shubman Gill lbw and another swerved for a large part on the outside edge. Santner has been all over India since then, hitting figures of 14-1-34-4 in the session. It took persistence and patience to get the first wicket, Gill in the 11th over of the day, but the new batsmen found it very difficult to start on this pitch.

When Virat Kohli missed a full toss for 1, Tom Latham brought Phillips to two left-arm batters, who proceeded to get them, one with turn and the other with a ball that went straight and stayed down.

It was in the first hour that New Zealand needed to keep believing. They continued to attack the pitches despite the likes of Gill and Yashasvi Jaiswal for big hits. Known of late to respond to such situations with an attack, India wanted to attack, but the bowling from Santner was good enough to deny them that. Gill managed to hit Tim Southee for a six, but had to bowl the fast bowler for that. Jaiswal had to play a reverse-sweep to get a boundary.

In the end, Santner was rewarded for his hard work when he got the umpire’s call for lbw. For Gill, this was almost a double chance in the first over. As the 15 seconds on the DRS timer ticked away, the crowd went into a frenzy at Kohli’s arrival. Their joy was short-lived as Kohli quickly missed a full toss, trying to clip it to square leg.

Now the effect of the roller was worn out. The batsmen used to bowl full balls or those that were approached by using the feet. Those who didn’t turn around made other doubts. As is often the case at such times, the fielders were all over the place, a hard sweep went straight to the short leg stump, a short ball was stopped and turned, and the pressure kept mounting.

It took Phillips four balls to open one and it took Jaiswal’s edge to slip. Rishabh Pant, who had been quiet on the inside fields, then went to pull one that was just short of a length. The ball stayed on the ground and threw him to the ground, he pulled an inaudible thing that could end up hitting Pant in the bag.

Sarfaraz Khan, who showed mastery against spin in Bengaluru, soon discovered that the margin for error was slim here. If you had to attack, you needed bad balls. He tried to go inside to get a really full ball, and it still went over cover. His sweep was blocked, bringing him singles. Finally he tried to clear a deep mid-off without getting to the ball, a reminder of Phillips’ dismissal on the first day. The batsman then introduced R Ashwin, Santner’s first three-wicket haul in a Test innings.