India captain KL Rahul revealed that the visitors dressing room at Sher-e-Bangla National Stadium was extremely worried when they were seven down for just 74 runs in the chase of 145 runs in the second and final Test match against hosts Bangladesh.
Going into Day 4, the game was poised nicely with Bangladesh needing another six wickets for a historic victory, and India 100 more runs on a slow and low deck at Mirpur.
The mission was accomplished by Ravichandran Ashwin and Shreyas Iyer who posted a match-winning unbeaten 71-run partnership for the eighth wicket, and drove India to a three-wicket victory.
“You trust the guys in the middle (during such situations). We've played enough cricket to realize that someone will put their hand up to win us the game. But I'm not going to lie, there was a lot of tension in the dressing room. It was a tough wicket to bat on, they put us under pressure in both innings,” said Rahul as India swept the two-Test series following their 2-1 loss to Bangladesh in the ODI series.
“It was a new-ball surface to some extent, once ball got softer, it was easier to score runs. It was a matter of who plays the new ball better. We did lose a few more wickets than ideal (in the chase) but we got the job done. Will take the win. That (bowling attack) has been the case for the last many years now. Wherever we've gone overseas in recent years, we have done the job.”
Chasing 145, India were reduced to 45/4 on day three and day four started with both teams in with 50-50 chance.
But Bangladesh closed in on victory, taking three Indian wickets, including the dangerman Rishabh Pant in just seven overs, to leave them at 74/7.
Iyer and Ashwin batted with caution and aggression to navigate the ship home.
Ashwin could have gone for one had Mominul Haque not put down his catch at short leg off Mehedi Hasan Miraz's bowling.
“We didn't have much batting left. It was one of those games where we let the game drift whenever we could have shut it off. Shreyas batted beautifully. Loved the way Shreyas batted,” said Ashwin.
“Pitches are quite good here. But I thought the ball got soft really quickly. Credit to Bangladesh, they put us under real pressure at certain moments,” he added.
