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War of words is nothing new when it comes to TeamIndia’s trips down under. But, this time around, one felt something amiss with Ricky Ponting’s rants. One felt, the Aussie cult was taking some beating, with their top under misfiring quite for some time now.
Warner is Hall of Fame material, but fact is he has fizzled out. Uzzie Khawaja is not getting any younger and he is yet to find a formidable partner, at least for the short term. Smith’s experiment has not gone well with opening and the fragility of Marnus’ pyro techniques has gotten real alarming.
Have a look at Australian batting since Jan 2023.
On further drilling down to stats from 2024
The numbers speak for itself; what is ailing the Aussies. There cannot be too many batters out of form in an XI while facing good teams. Do not make a mistake, the NZ home series was a debacle, and it would be a mistake to drub off this Indian team based on it. It was not bad luck, but a series of events featuring bad decision making and conditions suiting opposition, while batting. It was a timely wake up call for the Indians, to tighten the screw and feel motivated to prepare for the long series in Australia.
There were speculations and theories on how the order of venues will leave scars on the Indian batting line-up as series progresses, so much so that there will be no fuel left in the tank, by the time the team plays the 5th Test played at Sydney, where traditionally the pitch assists spinners.
These fears came through at the end of Day 1 of the Perth Test. Though the pundits plauded the stand-in captain Jassie Bumrah’s call to bat first on a visibly live pitch, it ignited fears of the pack falling like cards. At the end of the 1st innings, India’s total of 150 looked mediocre at best. Barring KL Rahul, against whom even the technology didn’t come to assist, on what looked like a howler from the third umpire adjudging out because of the spike in the snicko, which from later footage transpired was from bat hitting the pad. The umpire should not have overturned the on-field evidence, if conclusive evidence, this time in terms of relevant angle footage, was unavailable. What if, Rahul was not given out, is something we can only speculate. He looked the most organized among the Indian batsmen, amidst the chaos.
The Australian bowling is miserly. The number from Jan 2023 speaks that too.
This attack has been in business for long enough and 1400+ Test wickets do not come by accident. With no Pujara in the line-up, it was a cause of concern among the Indian fans, who will tire out the Aussie bowlers, each one of them too good not to provide a breather for the batters.
But the 150 the Indians scored had to be analyzed with a pinch of salt. It is inaccurate to judge a pitch before both the teams bat once. What followed was breath taking from an Indian fan’s perspective, or even for a neutral. The Australian top order was decimated by the end of Day 1. The way the stand-in captain spearheaded and masterminded the wickets were shear genius and looked obnoxious for the home spectators. The way the Top 5 batsmen were trapped in front and how they were set up was clearly from deep discussions from the drawing board and the immaculate execution of the Indian pacers. There were eyebrows raised on Siraj and Harshit Rana, who was drafted ahead of Akash Deep, who has not put a foot wrong, so far in his Test career. Rana looks like all you expected Prasidh Krishna to be, tall, lanky, and disconcerting bounce with no freebies on offer.
It was a kind of role reversal for the Indian team from the recent Bangalore Test against the Kiwis. India got the conditions heavily in favor of them, first while the Aussies batted and then when India batted second time around. The corner stone of this famous victory was the partnership between KL Rahul and Jaiswal on Day 2. Both gave it to the bowlers, while ball was new. Rahul, once again looked all at control. Pushed to the wall, his spot under scrutiny, there was visible decisiveness in his footwork and scoring thereof. 150 odd without a wicket loss at the end of Day 2 meant the hosts were truly deflated and looking down the barrel. India went far too ahead in the game that, the Aussies went submissive to defeat and the shoulders dropped.
Though Cummins the captain did all he could do to dry up runs, audacity was what Jaiswal and Kohli dished out at the Aussies. Though a mini-collapse of sorts happened after Jaiswal lost his wicket, a certain Virat Kohli was all at home and rookie Nitish Reddy brought T20 style hitting to rub salt on the Aussie wounds.
Once again, the vision of captain Bumrah to make the Australians bat in dwindling light, when shadow was all over the play area, paid rich dividends. 12/3 is a precarious position to recover from, when you are chasing in excess of 500. Pat Cummins’ tried to put up the steely face of captain, by promoting himself as the night watchmen, after delivering 25 overs. It simply ended as a misadventure. It was just a matter of time before the resistance ended. Smith looked determined for a while. Head and Marsh did themselves a world of good by spending some quality time in the middle.
The good thing for India that transpired at the end of 2nd innings was that India were not over reliant on Bumrah. The wickets were shared among all the bowlers. Siraj was once again rushing back to the top of his markup and there really was fire in his eyes. With Ashwin, Jadeja and possibly Shami bound to come in at some point, there looks no problem with potency of the attack, even in terms of the variety of pitches in the upcoming matches.
The series has begun in a mouth-watering manner. There is no chance this one will get settled any time soon or no one will be left wondering!! The Australians in their backyard, will turn up like wounded wolves at Adelaide.
*All stats are filtered from ESPNcricinfo/Statsguru
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