First with the bat, mountain-like runs, then with the ball, the day ends with half of the opposition team at home. At the end of the second day of the only Test against Afghanistan (IND vs AFG Test), the rush of the match was completely in India’s hands. After scoring 564 runs in the first innings on the board, India lost five wickets to Afghanistan for 113 runs at the end of the day. Courtesy of Young Turk Manav Suthar. Suther took three wickets with the ball in the first innings of his first Test.

On last night’s scorecard, Gill and Pant could not add too many runs together. That partnership finally broke after adding 48 runs earlier in the day. Mohammad Salim got his third success in the innings by dismissing Gill for 126 runs. After some time Jurel got out for 19 runs in consecutive overs and Panth returned to Sajghar with 81 runs after missing the century. Manav Suthar and Washington Sunder took the innings forward with a half-century partnership, taking India past the 500-run mark. Suthar was dismissed for 28 runs in his debut Test innings but Sundar survived.

Mohammad Siraj played a short but very interesting innings of 22 runs batting from the other end. Sundar also completed the sixth half-century of his Test career as India crossed the 550-run mark. After that, Shubman Gill decided to declare the innings. Mohammed Salim took five wickets in Tests for the first time in his career after Suthar was sent back to Sajghar.

Manav Suthar gave the first blow to Afghanistan in reply. He dismissed Abdul Malik for 16 runs. Prasidh Krishna broke the wicket of the other opener Sedikulla Atal for 17 runs. Sai Sudarshan took a good catch at slip from Suthar and brought back Gurbaz. Afghanistan’s Hashmatullah Shahidi and Rahman Shah handled the innings with three wickets falling. The two also built a partnership of 36 runs. However, Afghanistan lost two more wickets before the end of the day’s play. Suthar got his third success of the match by returning Afsar Jazai for three runs. Prasidh Krishna dismissed Shahidi. At the other end, the undefeated Rahmat Shah is now the place of hope for the Afghans. He is unbeaten on 43 runs.