New Zealand 140 for 3 (Guptill 64*, Ronchi 0*) trail India 557 for 5 dec by 417 runs

Half-centuries fromMartin Guptill and Tom Latham gave New Zealand a strongstart in response to India's mountainous first-innings total before R Ashwin struck 15 minutes before lunch to end their 118-run opening stand. At lunch on day three, New Zealand were 125 for 1, trailing India by 432 runs, with Guptill batting on 59.Latham had come into this Test match having scored 74 in his last innings,in Kolkata.

There, and in this innings, his success was partly down to the method he had worked out to reduce the likelihood of lbw against the spinners, by taking a shorter front-foot stride, and playing with his bat in front of his pad. Even in Kolkata, Ashwin had tried to exploit one pitfall of this technique - the increased chance of the left-hand batsman opening up while looking to play balls around leg stump - with two silly points in place, waiting for the leading edge.

Now, he managed to find the leading edge by looping one slower, just outside leg stump, and getting it to grip and turn. Latham, closing his bat-face early, popped up a simple return catch.Latham had just enjoyed a big slice of luck - looking to sweep Ravindra Jadeja, he had inside-edged the ball onto his boot, and it had then popped up to slip. Umpire Bruce Oxenford, though, turned down India's appeal, and did not consulteither his on-field colleague Kumar Dharmasena or the third umpire, suggesting he hadn't spotted the inside edge.The moment only added to India's frustrations on a morning where things just hadn't gone their way, thanks to a combination of smart batting from both openers, missed chances and half-chances, and a pitch that continued to behave in a manner contrary to its cracked and roughed-up appearance.

In the fourth over of the morning, Guptill drove loosely at Mohammed Shami and nicked to gully, where Ajinkya Rahane dropped a chance that went quickly but more or less straight to him. Then, three overs deeper into his spell, Shami watched in frustration as Latham flicked in the air only for the ball to fall short of Ravindra Jadeja, diving to his left from short midwicket. Both he and Umesh Yadav had bowled with one, and frequently two catchers in front of the wicket on the leg side, as Virat Kohli went with pace from both ends for the first ten overs of the morning.

New Zealand scored 23 runs in that period.Spin came on from both ends after that, and the runs started to flow quicker forboth batsmen. Both batsmen seemed to have figured out a defensive plan against Ashwin and Jadeja. Latham backed the short front-foot stride, and kepthis attacking options down to just three main options - the cut, the flick and the sweep. Guptill took stance on off stump to Ashwin, and took a long stride forward while defending, ensuring his pad would be outside the line of off stump if the ball turned past his inside edge. Against Jadeja, he opened up his stance, keeping his pad out of the way.

There was a sense of opportunism about their batting too, a desire not to let the spinners get on top of them. Latham swept Jadeja from just outside off stump in his first over, and then Guptill punished two minor infringements of length from the left-arm spinner, off successive balls: first he jumped back to a marginally short ball and smacked him to the midwicket boundary; then he saw one tossed up into his driving arc and lofted it effortlessly over the long-off boundary.

Both spinners dropped short with uncharacteristic frequency. Guptill slapped Jadeja to the cover boundary to bring up his fifty, and in the next over Latham whipped Ashwin through midwicket before driving him to the straight boundary when he over-compensated with his length.When Latham swept Jadeja for another four to bring up his half-century, New Zealand had scored 57 off their last 47 balls. India needed ideas to break this partnership. Ashwin happened to have a nifty one up his sleeve.