By Amlan Chakraborty
NEW DELHI (Reuters) -A freak dismissal, a maiden test hundred, and a rueful shake of the head after a miscalculation – West Indies opener John Campbell went through a whole range of emotions in the space of two innings in the ongoing second test against India.
Campbell’s 177-run stand with fellow centurion Shai Hope is why West Indies managed to drag the second and final test to its fifth day despite being made to follow on.
India need 58 runs on Tuesday to complete a 2-0 series sweep but could have accomplished that a lot earlier, especially after declaring their first innings on 518-5 and then bowling West Indies out for 248.
Campbell managed 10 on Saturday before his bizarre dismissal when his full-blooded shot cannoned into the helmet grille of B Sai Sudharsan at forward short leg before neatly dropping into the cupped hands of the fielder trying to evade the ball.
Sudharsan immediately left the ground and spent significant time under medical observation.
Forced to follow-on, West Indies finally rediscovered their stomach to fight, courtesy of Campbell (115) and Hope (103), and posted 390 before being all out.
“It’s a big positive for us,” Campbell told reporters.
“Having not got the best first innings, we came out in the second innings and batted over 100 overs, so that’s a big plus for us.”
Campbell told the host broadcasters that the joy of registering his test hundred was yet to sink in.
CAMPBELL RUES REVERSE SWEEP MISCALCULATION
The left-handed batter, however, was aghast at playing a reverse sweep against Ravindra Jadeja that led to his lbw dismissal.
“At that time I just thought a shot was on. Just a little bit of a miscalculation on my part,” he said.
Campbell successfully reviewed an lbw decision against him and was on the right side of it on two other occasions in his eventful knock.
There was enough application in his approach as well.
The batter said he intentionally tried to plant his front foot across and outside the off-stump to reduce the risk of lbw dismissals.
“It’s a little bit of luck getting the call on my side on those occasions. But definitely I was trying to get a good enough stride to get myself outside the line,” he said.
Not being able to convert it into a ‘daddy hundred’ hurt him though.
“I never want to get out, but that’s the nature of sport,” Campbell added before explaining what the thinking was when he and Hope were batting together.
“We just wanted to bat as long as possible, that was always the plan. We got that start, so we wanted to take it as deep as possible.”
(Reporting by Amlan Chakraborty in New Delhi; editing by Ken Ferris)
