'We're ahead in this game'

Beautifully timed on-drives, elegant hits down the ground and plenty of patience against the faster bowlers were the features that were most visible in Litton Das's maiden half-century.

While the 20-year-old is yet to cement his place in the Test squad, he surely did display the extent of maturity that one requires to be here. It was because of the sheer fluency of the innings that left many at the Zahur Ahmed Chowdhury Stadium in disbelief when he got caught behind in the 102nd over. The way he mapped his innings, he seemed to be heading for a bigger knock.

His was a wicket that fell against the run of play. With three wickets remaining, many reckoned that Litton would go after the bowlers once he reached his 50, however, a gem of a delivery from Simon Harmer dismissed him.

While the 20-year-old did enjoy the knock, he regretted not being able to score a big one.

"I wanted to make a bigger score, since I was the only regular batsman at the crease at that point of time and the rest were lower-order batsmen. I think I played quite well for as long as I batted.

"I wanted to play the maximum number of deliveries with the bowlers. But unfortunately I got out. Batsmen get out for a reason and I think maybe I made a wrong decision against that delivery that got me out," explained Litton.

Despite not being able to reach his desired score, Litton reckons that the hosts are still ahead in this game at this point of time.

"The wicket is very slow and it isn't very easy to play shots. I had to be careful. Every day you need to play differently and so today the situation demanded me to be a bit cautious.

"I tried to play for the team. I thought my 50 was helpful. Our target was to score as many runs as possible after securing the lead. It would have been better had we got more runs, but I will still say that we are ahead in this game. The 78-run lead is good enough," opined Litton.

"I think if we can dismiss them to a total that provides us a target of around 150 to 200, that will be good for us because the wicket is quite slow and you can't score runs that easily here," he added.

Having spent an ample amount of time at the crease yesterday, Litton also had some advice for Bangladesh's bowlers.

"Firstly we have to bowl a disciplined line. If we can do that it will be possible [to restrict them]. The plus point is that we are still ahead.

"My advice to the bowlers would be to bowl accurately and bowl wicket-to-wicket, because this pitch has a lot of help for them," he reckoned.

At the moment, Litton, who is playing just his second Test, seems to be enjoying himself. He took two brilliant catches behind the wicket in the first innings of the Test and followed that up with a composed knock.

Asked if he was enjoying himself, Litton merely replied with a word, 'Naturally'. While he seems to be on a roll, one would hope that the rest of the team shares his emotions, for the next two days are going to change the balance of this game, which is currently evenly stacked.