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Shreyas Iyer could not reach the three figures but played a knock to remember on a tough rank turner against Sri Lanka. Iyer took the aggressive approach where Indian batters struggled to read the bounce on a pitch that favoured spinners. His 92-run knock helped India post a total of 252 despite suffering a batting collapse.
Captaining India in Test for the second time, Rohit Sharma won the toss again and elected to bat first at M.Chinnaswamy Stadium. India did not get off to an ideal start as Mayank Agarwal unfortunately got run out on his homeground after a mix-up with skipper. Rohit did not stay long at the crease either and got out after scoring 15 runs from 25 deliveries. Lasith Embuldeniya got an outside edge off his bat which carried to slip fielder Dhananjaya de Silva. Hanuma Vihari looked solid in the middle during his partnership with Virat Kohli but became Praveen Jayawickrama's first victim of the day.
Kohli's wait for the 71st international century continued as he got out after scoring 23 runs. Kohli was bamboozled by the lack of bounce generated by Dhananjaya.
Rishabh Pant took the attacking approach right from the start as he danced down the track to hit spinners out of the attack. But Pant's cameo was cut short by Embuldeniya as he got bowled trying to play one square of the wicket. The wicketkeeper-batter contributed with a 26-ball 39 which included seven boundaries.
Iyer too adopted the Pant template as Ravindra Jadeja was surprised by the extra bounce generated by Embuldeniya. Ashwin stayed at the crease for a while but eventually edged one to the wicketkeeper Niroshan Dickwella. Ashwin became Dhananjaya's second victim of the day.
Axar Patel showed his intentions early on as well by hitting a big six but skipper Dimuth Karunaratne brought Suranga Lakmal back into the attack to get his wicket. Patel dragged the ball on to his stumps and got out for a single-digit score. Shami had a short stay at the crease as well with Jayawickrama getting the better of him.
After the fall of ninth wicket, Iyer tried to keep the most of the strike to himself. Iyer kept firing on all cylinders and was dropped a few times in the outfield. His luck eventually ran out when he reached the nineties. He got out for 92 off 98 deliveries including 10 fours and four sixes including one which was hit out of the stadium. India got out within two sessions on Day 1 but managed to post 252 at a run rate over four runs per over.
