On a green top Melbourne Boxing day wicket, Virat Kohli won the toss and batted first, with 2 new openers and not many gave a chance for Indians, especially after losing the test match at Perth. Hanuman Vihari provided a solid start and could not convert his effort into a personal milestone, but in the event of a win, his time at the crease was highly significant. Mayank Agarwal was not only brilliant with the bat, but also showed lot of promise as a bat-pad catcher. His 2 catches at forward short leg and 1 at silly mid-on was outstanding.
Pujara and Kohli played with a mission. They curtailed all their strokes and batted time to stitch in a match winning partnership. 215 runs at the end of 1st day and 228 runs on the 2nd day raised eyebrows as to the manner in which, Indians went about building the score. It turned out to be a great strategy, as the wicket started helping the bowlers, as the game progressed. Indian fast bowling trio, Bumrah-Ishant-Shami were unstoppable, especially Jasprit Bumrah bowled a match winning spell by picking 6 wickets and helped Indians bowl out Australia for a paltry score of 151 in their first innings.
A Lead of 292 runs was sufficient for Kohli and team, considering the bowler friendly Melbourne wicket and a weather forecast of heavy showers on Day 4 and Day 5. Much to everyone's surprise, Kohli decided to give his bowlers a rest and batted again. This decision did not hurt India too much, but the 2nd innings performance, both with the bat and the ball was no where close to a number one Test team's performance. Pat Cummins picked up a 6 for 27 in his 11 overs and wickets were gifted by Indian batsmen, as they played too many loose shots down the leg side.
Indians could add only 106 runs by losing 8 wickets and Kohli declared the innings to set Australia 399 to win the 3rd test. Shuan Marsh, Travis Head, Tim Paine and Usman Khawaja failed to convert their starts into a big one, pretty much the same story in this series so far. Pat Cummins fought with lot of grit and a lonely battle to score 63 and he could not stop Indians from going 2-1 up in the series, nor rains could save the aussies.
While Indians can cherish the victory, they could not hide some selection woes for them before the Sydney test. One can never get convinced that Rohit Sharma is a permanent fix for No.6 slot, as his shot selection is too loose for a Test call. In his first innings score of 63 not out, he did survive a drop catch by Peter Siddle, when he had scored only 15, Nathan Lyon being the unlucky one. Still, Kohli might not meddle with Rohit Sharma in Sydney. Ashwin would be fit for Sydney and Kohli should decide, whether he would play 2 spinners to increase his chances of winning the series 3-1. Kohli could think of bringing in Ashwin in place of Rohit Sharma.
Australians have lot of thinking to do now, as they are under tremendous pressure to square the series in Sydney. Tim Paine has to deliver more, both with his strategy and his contribution with the bat. Batsmen need to convert their starts into a big one and the same bowling combination would try to stop Indians from stitching partnerships. A wonderful series finisher coming up in Sydney and Indians have a great chance to create History.
No comments:
Post a Comment