Mominul Haque starred with the bat for Bangladesh in the first innings of the Kanpur Test between India and Bangladesh, as he brought up his century in the final over before lunch to crown a well-paced and patient innings.

The southpaw had come in at number three on the first day of the match, and was a slow starter as he played a watchful innings on a swinging pitch to work his way to 40* at stumps on day one.

Despite the following two days being rained out, came back and looked to be in solid touch again, playing his eye in in the first hour as Akash Deep and Jasprit Bumrah threatened with the ball.

Despite losing batting partners around him, Mominul batted well to safely reach his half-century in 110 balls, with a boundary off Mohammed Siraj bringing up his milestone with nine boundaries.

Having gotten his eye in and the ball getting older, Mominul began to play strong shots. His second 50 came up in just 62 balls, as Mominul played a sweep to bring up his century. He added eight more boundaries and a maximum during this time, as he sped up his batting to increase Bangladesh’s scoring rate.

Mominul entered the 90s with a six off Ravindra Jadeja, straight down the ground. He would receive a reprieve in the 90s as Rishabh Pant failed to hang on to a thin edge off the bowling of Ravichandran Ashwin. He also got away with a thick edge against Siraj, as a sharp diving chance was put down by Virat Kohli at slip.

Mominul extends his centurion record for Bangladesh

Mominul went into lunch batting on 102*, which is his maiden century on Indian soil, having previously struggled while visiting the country. It is also only Bangladesh’s second century in Indian conditions in 5 Test matches.

The left-handed batter also added onto his own record as the leading centurion for Bangladesh, with this being the 13th Test century of his career.

This is also the first century scored by a visiting batter at Green Park in Kanpur since 2004, when South African Andrew Hall struck 163 runs. There have been five centuries since then, but all scored by Indian batters.

The rest of the Bangladesh batting struggled on the fourth morning, losing three wickets of Mushfiqur Rahim, Litton Das, and Shakib Al Hasan, who couldn’t get going in testing conditions, and indicating the strength of Mominul’s innings as well.

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