Pujara's form prevails over Henry & Co

The pitch in Kolkata is radically different from the one we witnessed in Kanpur. There's a fair amount of grass cover on the pitch throughout. While Stephen Fleming was slightly concerned about the cracks on the pitch, it is common knowledge that big cracks don't open up on Indian pitches. It's the smaller cracks that eventually crumble in Indian conditions. Trent Boult started with three slips and a gully to Shikhar Dhawan. Even though he got appreciable swing and movement away from the left-handed batsman, Ross Taylor had placed a fielder at midwicket. Now, the presence of midwicket was a way to encourage him to stay within the stumps for Dhawan.

What is form? Form does not guarantee that you will always pick the line and length correctly and that you will always have an apt response to every ball, but the fact that you have an uncluttered mind. First ball of the sixth over, from Matt Henry to Cheteshwar Pujara, was perhaps the best ball of the morning on a couple of counts - the line was such that it was not possible for Pujara to leave it alone but still it was not close enough for him to get close or behind the ball. The length was such that he could neither go forward nor go deep inside the crease.

The third ball was another good one outside off that deceived Pujara. If you get beaten twice in three balls, doubts tend to find a way into your game and you become more cautious, and therefore you miss out on scoring opportunities too. But in the same over, Henry pitched a couple of balls fuller to which Pujara responded positively. A flick off the pads and drive down the ground displayed that Pujara had not allowed the two deliveries in the first half of the over to influence his thought process.

"Take singles and rotate the strike" - the most clichéd line you hear from experts discussing the art of batting, but in reality it's not as simple. Test matches are often played on pitches that do not allow you to manoeuvre the ball and therefore you either get a boundary or end up playing a dot ball. In addition to the pitch's behaviour, the bowling team also places the field to ensure that rotating strike is not easy. It was not surprising that 28 out of the first 32 runs India scored came in boundaries.

The six balls in the 16th over, from Neil Wagner, were bowled at a fairly different pace. The difference between two consecutive balls was around 5-6 kph. That is a lot. We talk about change of pace only when the bowler slows it down radically but we seldom talk about the change in pace when the bowler cranks it up. On a pitch that is a bit on the slower side, it is imperative to change the pace frequently without compromising on accuracy. Not only did Wagner put extra effort in bowling bouncers but once in a while, he bowled the full and wide ball a little fast too. Indian batsmen handled it well though.

Two balls - one went through straight after pitching, Pujara played for the spin but got the outside edge. Taylor at first slip was standing a little too wide. The cardinal rule while fielding in slips to an offspinner is to stay very close to the keeper. In most cases, the straighter one is expected to induce the edge and therefore is likely to go finer.

In Patel's next over, the fourth ball spun and bounced after pitching. Did it hit the crack? You could not feel any moisture on the surface in the morning and hence it is only fair to expect that this one hit one of the cracks.

Patel bowling from the High Court End. Two slips for an offspinner. There is a fielder manning the point boundary but there is no fielder at deep square leg. It is quite an interesting field placement, which is promoted by three factors. First, the ball is skidding and going straight more often. Second, the High Court End assists the ball to drift away from the right-handed batsmen. Third, since Pujara does not play the sweep shot, it makes sense to leave the area unmanned. Rahane is too new at the crease to try the sweep option.

One over from Mitchell Santner produced five runs, which included a nicely-struck boundary off the back foot by Rahane and that's all it took for Taylor to replace him with Boult. Throughout the day we saw a similar pattern of captaincy from Taylor, and that allowed New Zealand to retain control despite not taking a wicket in more than a session and a half. Most visiting teams disintegrate when a partnership develops but this New Zealand team showed better planning and execution.

The highlight of Pujara's batting in this series were the two shots he played today, both off Patel. He prefers playing most of the scoring shots against spinners off the back foot. It was slightly short with a bit of width and Pujara sliced it behind point for a four. A little later he played the same ball a little earlier to ensure that it went a little squarer to beat the fielder at deep point. The ability to hit the same ball to two different places by choosing to play the shot earlier or delaying it makes Pujara a difficult batsman to bowl at as a spinner.

The first over of the day saw a couple of balls lifting from a good-length spot and the rest barely reaching the keeper from an almost identical length. The same thing happened when the second new ball was taken. The harder new ball with a more pronounced seam has misbehaved a little irrespective of the time of the day. It will be interesting to see if this continues to happen on the second day too.