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Gayle storm leaves India reeling
After Gayle's blitzkrieg, Ganga hit a fine fifty to put the hosts on a firm footing in the 3rd Test. Scorecard
Opener Chris Gayle cracked a quickfire half-century to propel West Indies to a dazzling start after skipper Lara elected to bat against India in the third Test at St Kitts on Thursday.
At stumps on Day one, West Indies were comfortably cushioned at 207/1 with Daren Ganga batting on 64 and Ramnaresh Sarwan 44 not out.
The first wicket partnership of 143 runs between the openers Gayle and Ganga set the momentum for the Windies and left the visitors reeling.
The southpaw played a blazing knock and thrashed the Indian attack with some brutally powerful hitting before he was bowled out by a beauty off Munaf.
The quick-fire innings from Gayle came after a two-and-a-half-hour delay to the start with the entire first session lost to morning showers.
Only Anil Kumble and Munaf Patel were able to force the batsmen on the backfoot but runs continued to bleed from the other end.
Patel finally picked up a reward for his good bowling when he bowled the in-form left-hander for 83, which included eight fours and five sixes.
Gayle was ably supported by Ganga as the two first negotiated the opening spell from Munaf Patel and S Sreesanth and then settled into their rhythm.
After Gayle's departure, Ganga continued to build on the advantage with a fine half-century and his first against India. Sarwan gave him good company at the other end.
Earlier, the start of play was delayed due to a wet ground conditions caused by overnight rain.
After the play finally got underway, there was a brief interruption again with the West Indian innings only eight overs old when passing clouds forced the covers on.
Earlier, India made a couple of changes to their team composition. Harbhajan Singh was brought in place of Irfan Pathan. Sreesanth was also brought back after he missed the last Test due to injury.
West Indies made just one change, and chose to strengthen their batting, bringing Marlon Samuels, the middle-order batsman, into the team in place of Ian Bradshaw.
Earlier, the start of the play was delayed due to damp ground conditions.
The opening session was washed out owing to the wet ground conditions rendered by heavy downpour in last night and early this morning.
In order to make up for the lost time, it was decided that the second session would be of two and half hours with tea break scheduled at 1500 hrs.
Teams
West Indies 1 Daren Ganga, 2 Chris Gayle, 3 Ramnaresh Sarwan, 4 Brian Lara (capt), 5 Shivnarine Chanderpaul, 6 Dwayne Bravo, 7 Marlon Samuels, 8 Denesh Ramdin (wk), 9 Jerome Taylor, 10 Pedro Collins, 11 Corey Collymore.
India 1 Virender Sehwag, 2 Wasim Jaffer, 3 VVS Laxman, 4 Rahul Dravid (capt), 5 Yuvraj Singh, 6 Mohammad Kaif, 7 Mahendra Dhoni (wk), 8 Harbhajan Singh, 9 Anil Kumble, 10 Sreesanth, 11 Munaf Patel.
