Tea India 168 for 5 (Rahul 79*, Lyon 3-40) v Australia
Live 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. India 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 79 not out on his home ground in Bengaluru they would have been in far worse shape than the 168 for 5 at tea.
Meanwhile, Australia continued proving the bite behind their bark – this time after losing the toss. Most teams coming to the subcontinent will be aware their bowlers 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…
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. Nathan Lyon was precise with his line and smart with his length. Probing away outside the off stump, his ability to impart overspin contributed to one wicket and natural variation another but the biggest one he claimed 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, duped Kohli into thinking it was a lot shorter than it was. The batsman left the ball, it thudded into his pads in front of middle stump and umpire Nigel Llong put his finger up. While that can be forgiven, his gamble with the 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 79 not out off 175 balls was a battle all through. He was struck on the glove as Starc peppered him with short balls. 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 wrong hand (left) at silly mid-off.
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 cannot be said for his team-mates. Ajinkya Rahane hurtled down the pitch against Lyon only for the straighter ball 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. 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. The vagaries of the strip at the M Chinnaswamy stadium – hosting a Test for the first time since large-scale renovations of the outfield, although the square was untouched – indicated a total even in the region of 250 could still be challenging.
The chances of India getting up there were high in the morning, when their second wicket stand put on 61 runs in 25 overs. But it was broken – Lyon again making a ball jump at Pujara and having him caught at short leg. By tea, Australia’s GOAT had gutted India’s middle order and sent back their big three.
In such circumstances, the toss which Kohli won, and his decision to add an extra batsman to the XI, could result in a decent payoff. 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