Wasim Jaffer celebrates his half-century in Vadodara on Wednesday. (PTI)

Vadodara: Wasim Jaffer and Rahul Dravid provided a sedate, if not spectacular, start but Rest of India’s self-destructive batsmen collapsed in a heap to gift-wrap the opening day honours to Delhi in the Irani Trophy tie here on Wednesday.

Jaffer and Dravid stitched together a 77-run opening stand to lay the perfect foundation for a big total, but their teammates could not care less as they kept throwing away wickets regularly, and the team was all out for 252 in their first innings.

Delhi’s resilient bowlers sniffed the opportunity and hit back in the last two sessions to pin down their opponents.

At close, Aakash Chopra and Gautam Gambhir were at the crease for Delhi, having already knocked off 21 runs off Rest of India’s first-innings total.

Earlier, Ishant Sharma came up with a superb spell just after lunch to start the rot before Pradeep Sangwan ran through Rest of India’s lower order. Leg-spinner Chetanya Nanda also tasted success, while Virender Sehwag picked up a wicket.

After winning the toss, Anil Kumble had little hesitation in opting to bat first at the IPCL Stadium, and openers Jaffer and Dravid provided the right start. But hardly anything went right thereafter. Chief selector Dilip Vengsarkar and his colleagues would have a lot to think about after what they saw here on Wednesday.

Despite almost scoring a half-century, Dravid hardly looked like the batsman he is known as, while his illustrious teammates V. V. S. Laxman and Mahendra Singh Dhoni also failed to do justice to their reputation. At No.3, S. Badrinath was a complete letdown, while Mohammed Kaif withered before he could really bloom.

In the morning, Jaffer and Dravid looked as different as chalk and cheese. If Jaffer cantered, Dravid crawled and the former India captain looked in all sorts of trouble against Ishant, who somehow managed to derive awkward bounce from the lifeless track. Dravid treated Chetanya Nanda as if he was Ajantha Mendis.

Dravid was lucky to move beyond his personal score of two, thanks to Aakash Chopra’s largess in second slip. An Ishant delivery flew towards second slip where Aakash dived to his left and had it in his grasp, but it popped out of his hand.

Jaffer continued nonchalantly and went on to complete his 50 in 89 balls with the help of four boundaries.

The joy, however, was short-lived as two balls later, he uppishly drove Nanda for Virat Kohli, who took a smart catch at short extra cover. Thus Jaffer threw away a golden opportunity to impress the selectors.

At the other end, after 51 balls of prodding and nudging, Dravid finally hit his first boundary off Nanda and grew in confidence.