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Variable bounceWriddhiman Saha collected the first ball of the day with his fingers pointing skywards. The second ball was a lot shorter but this time Saha collected it around his waist. Later in the same over, one ball hit the lower half of Alastair Cooks bat and the ball bounced a few times en route to the fielder at slip. If there is variable bounce as early as the first over, you know what to expect for the five days. Expect the lines to be a lot straighter for faster bowlers and most wickets to come through leg-before and bowled.Slip fielding in the subcontinentIndia grassed a few catches in the first half hour of the game. Catching in the slips is an art and, at the highest level, it is assumed that you have mastered it and thereby earned the right to stand in the slips. But pitches in the subcontinent pose a challenge of a different kind. Since you are not sure about the bounce, you are best advised to get closer to the bat. It is better to drop the catch than for the ball to drop in front of you. So, for the same bowler, you would stand four steps closer in Rajkot than at Old Trafford. But the closer you get to the bat, the shorter the reaction time and the tougher the catch becomes. There might be less bounce on subcontinent pitches, but the pace off them is not radically different from the pace off pitches around the world. Given this, you might be a little less harsh the next time you see a catch dropped in slips in this series.Ashwin finds a work-aroundR Ashwin started from over the stumps to right-handed batsmen, bowled full and maintained an attacking line outside off. It did not work. On a pitch that is not offering anything substantial from the surface, the line outside off ceases to be as threatening as it is on a turning pitch. It is easier to counter the occasional lateral movement off the surface. That is why Ashwin went around the stumps, which enabled him to expose both edges. Suddenly every ball started finishing within the stumps, and that led to Haseeb Hameeds wicket. Moreover, Ashwins economy also improved - he did not concede a single boundary to right-handers off the first 44 balls he bowled to them from around the stumps, conceding only 17 runs off those deliveries.45.5 - Umesh Yadav, Joe Root and alarming seam movementThe ball has started reverse swinging and both Umesh Yadav and Mohammad Shami have exploited it well. But this particular ball pitches and changes direction alarmingly, and hits Joe Root on the body. While reverse swing is par for the course in dry conditions, movement off the surface is not, especially on the first day. But this pitch at Rajkot is a little different, with cracks running all through the 22 yards. The ball in question must have hit one of these cracks and deviated. Expect the cracks to widen as the sun beats down on this pitch. That will bring seamers into the picture.Rooted to the creaseRoot hit ten boundaries against spinners, and not even one boundary was while stepping out till he reached his century. There was only one boundary through the sweep and that too was off a full toss. Arent we told that the only way to succeed against spin in India is to either step out to smother spin or sweep as often as you can? Granted, it is the first day of a Test match on a decent pitch, but Root has shown that it is possible to succeed with a different game plan. His driving was meticulous, with a long forward stride and the precise transference of body weight at the point of impact. The bouncer barrage that never cameDuring Indias last tour to England, Ishant Sharma and co. had exploited Moeen Alis discomfort against bouncers. So much so that it felt that the moment he walked out to bat, bowling a bouncer was the obvious thing. He tried ducking, fending and attacking them, but was not successful with any of these approaches. That led one to believe that it would be worth trying the same ploy again but it did not happen today. Out of the first 30 balls that Moeen faced, 18 were bowled by the seamers and yet there wasnt a single bouncer whistling past his nose. Later, of course, the absence of a fully fit Shami made it impossible to have an extended spell of bouncers.Custom Jerseys Cheap . He said Tuesday thats a big reason why he is now the new coach of the Tennessee Titans. Whisenhunt said he hit it off quickly with Ruston Webster when interviewing for the job Friday night. Wholesale Custom Jerseys .35 million, one-year contract that avoided salary arbitration. Plouffe batted .254 with 14 home runs and 52 RBIs in 477 at-bats last season, his second as a regular in the lineup. https://www.cheapcustomjerseysonline.com/ . Third-seeded Murray had the easiest path to victory on New Years Eve, barely breaking a sweat during his 6-0, 6-0 win over 2,129th-ranked Qatari wildcard recipient Mousa Shanan Zayed. Custom Jerseys . -- The goal posts lying flat on the field, Arizonas fans lingered on the field, congregating around the locker room entrance nearly 30 minutes after rushing out of the stands. Fake Custom Jerseys .Y. -- Syracuse has turned up the defence at the right time all season, and when High Point threatened to pull off a monumental upset the second-ranked Orange did what they do best with their quick hands and savvy play.In one manner of thinking, the BCS and the College Football Playoff transformed college football from a regional to a national sport. The outcome of the Michigan-Wisconsin game Saturday has an impact on the Stanford-Washington winner and every other school in the hunt for one of four playoff berths. But with so many of its heroes, college football remains regional. Witness the deaths this week of former Nebraska offensive line coach Milt Tenopir, 76, and Iowa quarterback Randy Duncan, 79.Tenopir was the foreman of the assembly line that cranked out one All-American after another during head coach Tom Osbornes glory years. Duncan led the Hawkeyes to the 1958 Big Ten championship and the Rose Bowl, and finished second in the Heisman vote to Army back Pete Dawkins. Green Bay selected Duncan with the first pick of the 1959 NFL draft. He spurned the Packers for three years in the CFL, after which he went to law school. But he was forever a Hawkeye hero.If you want to know how current and former Huskers players felt about Tenopir, read Dirk Chatelains story in the Omaha World-Herald about the coachs last days. Prepare to be choked up.1. It has been 14 years since weve had three games that matched AP top-10 opponents, and the list of those games illustrates how much the power structure has changed since 2002. No. 1 Miami defeated No. 9 Florida State, the Hurricanes 28th consecutive victory in a string that reached 34; No. 2 Oklahoma defeated No. 3 Texas 35-24, the third of five straight Sooner victories in that rivalry, and remember how Mack Brown couldnt win the big one? He put that canard to rest in 2005; and No. 6 Georgia, under second-year coach Mark Richt, beat No. 10 Tennessee 18-13 in a game that served as a springboard for the Bulldogs to end their longest SEC championship drought (20 years) in school history.2. Likewise, two of this weeks three top-10 matchups could have a lasting impact on this season. If No. 3 Louisville wins at No. 5 Clemson, the Cardinals will have beaten their top two competitors in the ACC Atlantic (they embarrassed Florida State 63-20 two weeks ago). Given Oregons struggles, the game between No. 7 Stanford and No. 10 Washington will anoint the front-runner in the Pac-12 North. But since No. 8 Wisconsin and No. 4 Michigan are in different divisions of the Big Ten, the outcome of their game will take a back seat to the teams head-to-head matchup against whichever divisional foe challenges them.3. One last note about the demise of LSU head coach Les Miles, fired because the Tigers couldnt keep up with the Alabama dynasty coached by his predecessor, Nick Saban. Contrast Miles unwillingness to change the Tigers offense to the evolution that the Crimson Tide has undergone during the Saban Decade. Saban has gotten smaller and quicker on defense. He has said that Terrence Cody, the 6-foot-4, 345-pound two-time All-American defensive tackle, wouldnt fit in the current Tide defense. And after beeginning in Tuscaloosa with a pro-style offense, Saban and coordinator Lane Kiffin have spread the field with running-passing freshman Jalen Hurts in charge.dddddddddddd.4. As the Big 12 dithers over whether to expand, and it looks increasingly as if the league couldnt get eight votes to decide that today is Thursday, Houston is making a compelling case for an invitation. Members of a conference want a new member to carry its own weight in the marketplace. And Houston is doing that in its home TV market. Since Texas A&M bolted to the SEC, so has the Houston TV market. SEC games made up six of the top 10 football telecasts last season in Houston. But this season, the Cougars game against Oklahoma on Sept. 3 had a 12.8 rating in Houston, and the Thursday night game against Cincinnati on Sept. 15 had a 6.78. Those are big numbers.5. The top talents among the 156 semifinalists for the Campbell Trophy, the Academic Heisman awarded by the National Football Foundation, include at least three compelling stories: BYU sixth-year, oft-injured quarterback Taysom Hill, Duke corner DeVon Edwards, who just tore his left ACL and MCL on Saturday, and Syracuse tight end Cameron MacPherson, the grandson of College Football Hall of Fame coach Dick MacPherson. The NFF will name on Nov. 1 the 12 to 14 finalists, each of whom will receive an $18,000 postgraduate scholarship. The Campbell Trophy winner, named at the Hall of Fame dinner on Dec. 6, receives an additional $7,000 grant.6. Penn State is still suffering the effects of the NCAA scholarship penalties. You can judge that by the scoreboard, where the Nittany Lions are 0-2 against Power 5 opponents, including a 49-10 loss at Michigan on Saturday as one-sided as it appears. Or you can judge that by the comments of Penn State head coach James Franklin at his weekly media conference on Tuesday. Their (\[defensive] front is big, strong and physical, and we did not handle that well, Franklin said. Defensively, I think were playing hard; however, we need to be more physical up front. To paraphrase Franklin, Penn State isnt as talented as Michigan. And undefeated Minnesota (3-0) comes to State College on Saturday.7. Georgia Tech (3-1, 0-1) already has won as many games this season as it did last, but the 26-7 loss at Clemson last Thursday night, when Tech gained only 124 yards, illustrated how head coach Paul Johnson hasnt solved his offensive woes. Johnsons option attack at its best chews up yardage and clock in big chunks, which is to say, the statistic that most reveals Georgia Techs struggles is time of possession. The Yellow Jackets rank 61st in the FBS, averaging 29:38 per game. Thats four-plus minutes fewer than in 2014, the year that Georgia Tech won the ACC Coastal. The Yellow Jackets finished third in the FBS that season, averaging 34:09 per game. ' ' '