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Her Excellency Sheikh Hasina, Prime Minister of Bangladesh, @MamataOfficial, Honourable Chief Minister, West Bengal ring the bell at the iconic Eden Gardens.#PinkBallTest @Paytm #INDvBAN pic.twitter.com/a0e3Oh8Ygd
— BCCI (@BCCI) November 22, 2019
The Eden bell was rung by Sheikh Hasina and Mamata Banerjee in the presence of Sourav Ganguly.
Her Excellency Sheikh Hasina, Prime Minister of Bangladesh, @MamataOfficial, Honourable Chief Minister, West Bengal and #TeamIndia great @sachin_rt greet #TeamIndia ahead of the #PinkballTest pic.twitter.com/ldyrKjbxrE
— BCCI (@BCCI) November 22, 2019
After long resisting the latest innovation in Test cricket, India will join the party that is aimed at increasing crowds and TV audiences for the longest format of the game. Day-night Tests were successfully introduced in 2015 but it took India a new BCCI regime under former captain Sourav Ganguly to take the pink ball plunge. Ahead of the ongoing series, Ganguly convinced the Bangladesh Cricket Board to play a Test under floodlights and now he has arranged a grand spectacle at the Eden Gardens.
So far, 11 day-night Tests have been played worldwide since Australia and New Zealand played the first-ever pink-ball Test at the Adelaide Oval in November 2015.
Cricket Australia wanted the Adelaide Test to become a permanent day-night fixture and hoped for India to agree but the visitors did not endorse the idea during their most successful tour Down Under.
Australia’s cricket chief Kevin Roberts had said that he hoped to convince India of the merits of a day-night Adelaide Test on their next tour during the 2020-21 season.
Under current ICC rules, the touring team can deny the home board’s fixture requests, but that may change soon.
At home too, India were not open to the idea until Ganguly stepped into the picture and found skipper Virat Kohli on the same page.
Ganguly has not left any stone unturned to make India’s maiden day-night Test a spectacle to remember. He has also promised a sellout crowd for the first three days of the match.
The first four days are indeed sold out, according to former India captain Sunil Gavaskar.
Kolkata is awash with pink for the match. Sourav Ganguly tweeted pictures of sweets and buildings in various shades of pink.
Landmarks like the Big Ben on Laketown, Howrah Bridge, Tata Centre, Eden Gardens, the Elliot Park, and Shahid Minar have been lit up in pink.
Amid all the hype, India are eyeing a 12th successive home series victory.
The pace attack of Mohammed Shami, Ishant Sharma and Umesh Yadav took 14 wickets in Indore as the hosts wrapped up the Test inside three days with an innings and 130-run victory.
Moreover, Kohli registered his 10th innings win as India’s Test captain to go past MS Dhoni’s tally of nine and Mohammad Azharuddin’s eight as the hosts took a 1-0 lead in two-match series.
The win in Indore was also India’s sixth consecutive Test victory as the hosts equalled their best-ever run in the longest format.
India had previously won six consecutive Tests under MS Dhoni in 2013.
As far as the ICC World Test Championship is concerned, India sit at the top of the table with 300 points from 6 wins.
Squads:
India: Virat Kohli (capt), Rohit Sharma, Mayank Agarwal, Cheteshwar Pujara, Ajinkya Rahane, Wriddhiman Saha (wk), Ravichandran Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja, Rishabh Pant, Mohammed Shami, Ishant Sharma, Umesh Yadav, Hanuma Vihari, Kuldeep Yadav and Shubman Gill.
Bangladesh: Mominul Haque (capt), Liton Das (wk), Mehidy Hasan, Nayeem Hasan, Al-Amin Hossain, Ebadot Hossain, Mossadek Hossain, Shadman Islam, Taijul Islam, Abu Jayed, Imrul Kayes, Mahmudullah, Mohammad Mithun, Mushfiqur Rahim, Mustafizur Rahman.
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