The opening test of the Border-Gavaskar series was a rather one-sided affair as India crushed the visitors by a huge margin of an inning and 132 runs on day 3 at the VCA Stadium in Nagpur. For Australia, it was also their lowest total ever against India, managing 91 runs with Steven Smith hanging till the end at 25*(51).
Much like the first two days, the hosts dominated the third day of the match too despite losing Jadeja early in the day. Much to the fans’ delight all-rounder Axar Patel stitched a 51 runs partnership with Mohammad Shami for the ninth wicket which almost closed things off for the Aussies.
“I believe it’s worth to roll the dice a little bit”- Mark Waugh
From their batting on day 1 to the lackluster bowling display, Pat Cummins and Co. for all were just chasing the game. Disappointed with his team’s efforts, former Australian star Mark Waugh highlighted that less usage of short balls and below-par fielding might have caused the result.
“I know the surface is slow but never know what you can get out of it. I think Australia only bowled two or three short balls in the entire innings. I think they should have hit the pitch hard and see what happens. Maybe the Australians are guilty of not trying enough and waiting for something to happen, a mistake by the Indian batters maybe.” said Mark Waugh
“I would have liked to see Pat Cummins bowl a bit more. I don’t think they bowled enough short stuff. When the tail enders start to form a partnership and look comfortable on the crease, I believe it’s worth to roll the dice a little bit.” told Waugh.
Spin Being the King
The hues and cry over the pitch being a rank-turner were dismissed the very first day when India’s veteran all-rounder Jadeja made a comeback to test cricket with a 5 wicket-haul and called it a fairground, which was followed by Australia’s debutant Todd Murphy bagging his first fifer with off-spin magic on day 2.
And as per the trend, the third day as well belonged to spin, Ravichandran Ashwin claiming his 5 wickets coupled with Jadeja’s to dismantle the Aussie attack on the red soil.
Apart from the tweakers, the shining light of the match was the Indian skipper Rohit Sharma, who with his magnificent century 120(212) became the first Indian captain to score a century in all three formats and retained his 100% captaincy record as the Test captain.
Also, Read: ;IND vs AUS: Australian Todd Murphy Knocks Off Indian Batting, Creates 141-Year-Old Rear Record