Australia 40 for 0 (Warner 23*, Renshaw 15*) trail India 189 (Rahul 90, Lyon 8-50) by 149 runs
Scorecard and ball-by-ball details
04:42
Binoy: Unbelievable that Kohli chose to review his lbw
First there was control, then panic and eventually wickets. Most of them went to Nathan Lyon, who was precise with his line and smart with his length. His 8 for 50 was the best ever haul by a visiting bowler in India. Back when they lost the toss, Australia would never have imagined they would be batting with an hour left to stumps on the first day. They ransacked 10 wickets for a mere 189 runs, then finished the day 40 for 0 and have done their chances of retaining the Border-Gavaskar trophy absolutely no harm.
Most teams coming to the subcontinent will be aware they have to invest heavily in maintaining tight lines and lengths for pressure is as good as any help they might receive off the pitch to pick up wickets. The batsman starts to feel trapped, doubts begin to fester, he searches for release and…
India know this template well. Yet they lost Cheteshwar Pujara on the stroke of lunch. Virat Kohli gave his wicket away – and then a review as well – by padding up to a straight ball. And were it not for KL Rahul‘s 90 on his home ground in Bengaluru, they would have been in far worse shape than 189 all out.
Mitchell Starc and Josh Hazlewood were in prime form with the new ball. Six of the first 12 overs on Saturday were maidens, the result of their getting just enough movement in the air and off the pitch. Lyon, probing away outside the off stump with his ability to impart overspin, got the ball to turn and bounce sharply on some occasions and go straight on at other times. His biggest strike, however, was simply down to a set up.
Kohli was new to the crease and only a few seconds ago had a good length ball jumped past his inside edge and hit his thigh pad. Something told the Indian captain he can trust the bounce, that if he is playing on the back foot, the ball will likely not threaten his stumps. That made picking length very, very important. Lyon flattened his trajectory, Kohli left the ball, suckered into believing it was short of a length, it thudded into his pads in front of middle stump and umpire Nigel Llong put his finger up. While the error in judgment can be forgiven, the gamble with DRS, driven not by logic but by hope, and even a little bit of fear at losing the best batsman in the team and also giving Australia the kind of momentum they would love, was less so.
Watching from the other end was Rahul. His innings spanned 205 balls – the next best was a mere 66 – was a battle all through. He was struck on the glove as Starc peppered him with bouncers. He was squared up consistently by Hazlewood’s outswing. And even as the batsman tried to line himself up on off stump to be in better position to handle that, the inswinger messed up all those plans. With his score on 30, he could have been caught but even Peter Handscomb, whose agility is already becoming legend, was unable to hold on to a terribly difficult, low catch to his left and wrong hand at silly mid-off.
Nathan Lyon’s 8 for 50 was the best figures by a visiting bowler in India © Associated Press
Rahul had the mettle to work past his troubles, to not buckle to pressure and go looking for that boundary that makes him feel better for but an instant. He had had enough of that in Pune. Normally a free-flowing batsman – he struck the first ball of the match off Starc to the point boundary – he understood the value of a set batsman making a big score. With time at the crease, his defensive game grew tighter. But most of all, he was able to absorb all the pressure Australia piled up on him.
The same could not be said of his team-mates. Ajinkya Rahane hurtled down the pitch against Lyon only for the straighter ball to beat his outside edge. He was so far outside his crease that Matthew Wade even had time to recover from a fumble and pull off the stumping. The 17 runs he made marked the ninth time out of 10 innings that he has fallen for a score under 30. Karun Nair, who was brought in to lengthen the batting line-up, playing for the first time since his 303 not out in December, committed the same mistake against O’Keefe and this time the ball turned sharply to leave him stumped too.
Against the vagaries of the M Chinnaswamy strip – hosting a Test for the first time since large-scale renovations of the outfield, although the square was untouched – and the discipline of the Australian bowlers, it was difficult not to imagine India as those kids waiting for Mum and Dad to slack off so they can raid the sweets in the pantry. But by the end of the day, with no hope of their craving being satisfied, they could only fold their hands over their chest and go “hmpf”. The only time they looked in any control was when their second wicket stand put on 61 runs in 25 overs. But it too was broken by Lyon, off what became the last ball before lunch, as one jumped at Pujara and had him caught at short leg. By tea, Australia’s GOAT had gutted India’s middle order and sent back their big three.
Considering that, it was no surprise the lower order was no match. R Ashwin was undone by a spitting cobra. Wriddhiman Saha edged one that didn’t turn as much as he thought. Ravindra Jadeja inside edged a catch off the pad to slip – which was only confirmed when Smith made fine use of the review available to him. Even there, Australia were thumping India. And it all tied in to Lyon’s skill. A newfound skill.
In the early part of his career, he couldn’t figure out how to bowl on turners. He would either be too slow and too full and get driven a lot, or too quick and too short leading to outcomes a lot worse. Here all of his wickets came off the 5 to 6m mark. For a batsman, that meant even if he came forward, he couldn’t reach the pitch of the ball The only hope of making connection then is pushing his hands out in front and therefore compromising on his balance. Playing back is a risk too because Lyon’s overspin generates extra bounce.
Against that, the extra batsman in their XI couldn’t save them either. M Vijay, however, was not part of that number having injured his left shoulder in the 333-run defeat in Pune. In his place came Tamil Nadu team-mate Abhinav Mukund. The 27-year old was representing India for the first time in over five years and his team was using their eighth opening pair in the last 12 months. He got an eight-ball duck, the partnership yielded only 11 runs, the position is clearly cursed, it time to call Scooby Doo yet?
Alagappan Muthu is a sub-editor at ESPNcricinfo
© ESPN Sports Media Ltd.
Source: ESPN Crickinfo