Ravichandran Ashwin created a unique record on the opening day of the first Test between India and West Indies in Dominica on Wednesday. The 36-year-old has come back into the playing XI after being excluded from the side in the final of the World Test Championship (WTC) last month. He made an impact straightaway by dismissing Caribbean opener Tagenarine Chandrepaul in the 13th over of the game.
Ashwin clean bowled the southpaw to draw the first blood in the encounter and locked his name in the record books in the process. Interestingly, Ashwin has dismissed Tagenarine’s father and West Indian great Shivnarine Chandrepaul four times in the past. All those four dismissals were in India when West Indies toured the sub-continent in 2011 and 2013 respectively.
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Ashwin had sent the senior Chandrepaul back to the pavilion twice each in those two series. Firstly, he dismissed him in Delhi and Kolkata in 2011 before getting him out once each in Kolkata and Mumbai in 2013. With Tagenarine’s wicket, Ashwin has become the first-ever Indian to dismiss a father-son duo in Test cricket. He has also joined a coveted list of only five players who have scaled this feat in international cricket.
Only Ian Botham, Wasim Akram, Mitchell Starc, and Simon Harmer have recorded such an achievement before in Test cricket. Botham and Akram had dismissed the Kiwi father-son pair of Lance and Chris Cairns. On the other hand, Starc and Harmer have gotten the duo of Shivnarine Chandrepaul and Tagenarine out previously.
Overall, India had a field day at work as they bowled out West Indies for 150 in the first innings. Indian openers Rohit Sharma and Yashasvi Jaiswal put up 80 on the board as the Men in Blue brought curtains down to the day at the fall of no wickets.
