India poised to enforce follow-on

Chittagong, May 21 (UNI) Bangladesh were struggling to avoid follow on after Indian bolwers struck in regular intervals to reduce the hosts to 160 for 8 at tea on the fourth day of the first Test here today.

Earlier, Indian innings came to a close at 387 for eight declared.

At tea, Mashrafee Mortaza (33) and Shahadat Hossain (1) were at the crease.

It was a heartening sight though as the sun came out to dispel the gloom of no cricket yesterday with around 12 hours of the game lost to rain.

Coming to bat after the third day's play was washed out by rain at 384 for six, India declared the innings at the fall of Mahendra Singh Dhoni who drove straight down the throat of Javed Omar off Mortaza without adding to his overnight score of 36.

Dhoni came out to bat with Zaheer Khan on the fourth day morning today, after Anil Kumble retired hurt due to illness. Administrative Manager Surendra Bhave confirmed that he was down with fever and was under medication.

But there was no indication whether he would play any further part in the match or not. This was not such a big blow in batting department, but could have a role to play as India look to bowl Bangladesh out on a good batting pitch.

Zaheer went early in the day, hanging his bat out outside the off stump to one from Shahadat Hossain that took an edge after bouncing to be gobbled up by Khaled Mashud behind the wickets. VRV Singh was out to bat.

But the real blow for India came when Dhoni went after a short and wide delivery from Mortaza and didn't get the elevation he wanted. Mortaza returned with figures of four for 97 while Shahadat got three for 96 for his efforts.

India struck back with a vengeance with RP Singh continuing to ride his luck to claim two wickets. The first wicket came when he trapped Javed Omar lbw before the stumps for seven, even as the batsman showed signs of blossoming.

RP Singh who was initially drafted into the side for the ODIs did not get a game as the third one was a washout. Then he was retained for the Tests as Sreesanth returned with an injury and included into the playing eleven when Munaf Patel was ruled out for the series with a lower back injury.

Now he showed why he was a good choice, inducing Habibur Bashar to edge one to Tendulkar at first slip for a duck. With two wickets in his kitty, R P looked good for many more.

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