THE recent heatwave may have played its part but it is still unusual for a spinner, even one as fine as Ravichandran Ashwin, to bowl 29 per cent of the overs on the opening day of a Test match in England.
It was fully justified, too, as he bowled superbly, having taken 4-60 off 25 overs by the close of play. All talk during the white-ball hors d’oeuvre to this series was how England’s batsmen might struggle against the wrist-spin of Kuldeep Yadav. Few mentioned Ashwin, a classy spinner with 320 Test wickets.
Kohli brought him on inside the first hour of play and he immediately b...
