After some minor middle-order hiccups threatened to keep India below 250, Yuvraj shepherded the lower order even as he made an unbeaten 102, hitting nine fours and four sixes. His stand of 92 for the seventh wicket with Ajit Agarkar capitalised on indifferent Bangladeshi bowling, coming off just under 10 overs.

India's tailenders may have missed a trick or two in denying their side a total above 300 - Baisya castled two in two and Avishkar Salvi had a none-too-impressive debut with the bat - but Yuvraj had already gotten his big hitting in before Agarkar's dismissal.

Spinner after spinner was treated with disdain as Yuvraj used power and timing to murderous effect, pulling often to midwicket and driving the ball elegantly on either side of the wicket.

Earlier, both Sourav Ganguly and Mohammad Kaif had looked so untroubled that they could conceivably have batted through the innings, and rash strokes, not fantastic bowling, were the seed of their downfall. First Ganguly found the long-on fielder in pursuit of another six (132 for 3), and then Kaif, sweeping Sanwar Hossain, got a thin edge and was caught behind (144 for 4).

It was left to Yuvraj to steer the lower order through the final overs, and he did so admirably. Wickets continued to fall around him, though. Dinesh Mongia was ruled leg-before (162 for 5), while Parthiv Patel spooned an easy return catch back to Sanwar (172 for 6).

Bangladesh will be batting second under lights, in humid conditions, in front of a home crowd that lusts for success after a World Cup debacle. Chasing 277, even against a depleted Indian attack, will be challenging, to say the very least.

Sehwag, perhaps celebrating his first match as vice-captain, struck 63 off just 51 balls, hitting 11 fours and a six. He had one slice of fortune when a leading edge fell safely beyond cover, but clean hits punctuated the remainder of his innings. One Manjural Islam over was taken for three boundaries, two of them thumped straight back past the bowler and the third eased through covers.

Gambhir, making his debut, would have had his nerves alleviated somewhat by the fireworks at the other end. He struck two fours as well, but immediately after the second of them - pulled in front of square - he fell, playing neither forward nor back to Tapash Baisya and getting a faint edge through to the wicketkeeper.

Sehwag marched on unaffected. One Tapash Baisya over, the 12th of the innings, was punished to the tune of 18 runs. After whipping the bowler to square leg for two fours, Sehwag cut the fourth ball for four more behind point. The next delivery was sent flying over midwicket, getting Sehwag his fifty off only 44 deliveries.

Bangladesh then looked to spin to slow the pace of the game, and Mohammad Rafique broke through in his first over. A straight ball, pitching on off stump, struck Sehwag in line with the stumps and cutting short what looked till then like a big score there for the taking.

Ganguly and Kaif, aware that they needed only to play sensibly to bat Bangladesh out of the game, started to rotate the strike regularly as soon as the field restrictions were eased. They were helped in no small measure by lethargic Bangladeshi fielding, which culminated with Alok Kapali dropping the Indian captain at backward point.

To rub it in, Ganguly took to Rafique in the very next over, dancing down the wicket and hitting him twice for mighty sixes into the midwicket stands. At the halfway stage of the innings, both batsmen looked supremely untroubled, and India seemed set for a total well in excess of 250.

Dhaka in April is typically hot and humid, and today is no different. The temperature in the middle towards the start of the match hovers in the mid-40s, while the humidity is expected to go as high as 86 percent. The track, like many other subcontinental ones, is dry and slow, expected to get slower as the day progresses. Keeping these weather and pitch-conditions in mind, then, Sourav Ganguly unhesitatingly chose to bat first after winning the toss.

Ganguly is practically the only really experienced batsman in the Indian team after Sachin Tendulkar and Rahul Dravid opted out of the tournament on grounds of fitness. The bowling is only marginally better, with Zaheer Khan and Harbhajan Singh the sole remnants of the much-vaunted World Cup attack. Gautam Gambhir and Avishkar Salvi, strong performers on the Indian domestic circuit, make their international debut.

Teams

India: 1 Gautam Gambhir, 2 Virender Sehwag, 3 Sourav Ganguly (capt), 4 Mohammad Kaif, 5 Yuvraj Singh, 6 Parthiv Patel (wk), 7 Dinesh Mongia, 8 Harbhajan Singh, 9 Ajit Agarkar, 10 Avishkar Salvi, 11 Zaheer Khan

Bangladesh: 1 Mehrab Hossain, 2 Mohammad Ashraful, 3 Tushar Imran, 4 Alok Kapali, 5 Akram Khan, 6 Sanwar Hossain, 7 Khaled Mashud (wk), 8 Khaled Mahmud (capt), 9 Mohammad Rafique, 10 Tapash Baisya, 11 Manjural Islam