On an action-packed Friday that produced the second most runs on a day of Test cricket in India, a single delivery might otherwise not have been the talking point had it not been the last ball of the day, and had it not accounted for one of India’s premier batters of all time.

Rachin Ravindra, with his second Test century, and Tim Southee, batting with an authority and comfort not necessarily associated with a No. 9, seemed to have put the first Test beyond India’s reach at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium on Day Three of the first Test. Their eighth-wicket alliance of 137, at better than a run a ball, rallied New Zealand from a mini-collapse and propelled them to 402, a decisive first-innings lead of 356.