The Indian cricket team under Virat Kohli faced its worst hour of embarrassment as it collapsed to its lowest score in the test of 36 as a devastating Australia sailed to an emphatic eight wicket victory in two and a half days in the inaugural test of the day / Saturday night. There were no demons on the court, but Josh Hazlewood (5-3-8-5) and Patrick Cummins (10.2-4-21-4) displayed fast bowling of the highest quality, the impact of which will be powerful with three more. . Tests to go. India’s previous lowest score was 42 at the Lord’s in 1974 against England, known in Indian cricket parlance as the “Summer of 42.”
Saturday’s total was also the lowest score in the short history of D / N testing and the fifth lowest overall. The home team achieved the easy goal of 90 runs in just 21 overs without much fuss. They lost only Matthew Wade (33) and Marnus Labuschagne (6) in search of the easy goal, and in the process, starter Joe Burns (51) built up a half-century of confidence.
India has already lost three successive tests in three days and two of them were held in New Zealand earlier this year. To make matters worse for the visitors, star pacemaker Mohammed Shami’s series could well have ended due to a wrist injury from a short ball from Pat Cummins, which could potentially be a fracture. Shami was unable to continue and the Indian innings ended at 36 for 9 in 21.2 overs.
People like Sunil Gavaskar and the late Ajit Wadekar had long carried the luggage of that English summer, arguably one of the worst in the annals of Indian cricket. Now it will be replaced by the “Summer of 36”. Call it irony, but like Gavaskar back then, a great modern like Virat Kohli will have this little avoidable story in his legacy, a day when one could hardly figure out what went wrong. At one point, India was down to 26 out of 8 and seemed to equal the lowest score ever (26 for New Zealand vs England) but Hanuma Vihari’s limit helped them evade entry into the dark pages of cricket history. .
The Indian hitting was fully exposed by the extra bounce generated by the Australian pacemakers, who threw each pitch into the middle channel after landing at the seam. In an inexplicable collapse, India’s batsmen dropped like nine pins and not a single one could reach double figures.
Once night watchman Jasprit Bumrah (2) came out in the first over, Hazlewood and Cummins (10.2-4-21-4) literally decimated the tourists and also caused lasting damage to their pride. The likes of Mayank Agarwal (9), Cheteshwar Pujara (0), and Ajinkya Rahane (0) all came out similarly.
All deliveries were nearly identical, at an angle, forcing hitters to hit them and bounce a little more. They deflected a shadow bringing the outer edges to Tim Paine behind the stumps. Kohli (4) was fired the way he used to go out in England in 2014, trying to drive a delivery on the fifth stump and trapped in a ravine.
Long story short, the Indian hitters did not take into account that the pitch suddenly got more lively with an additional bounce. The two Australian pacemakers threw deliveries that the visiting hitters had to play through and the ultra-defensive mentality they carried from the first innings did not help their cause.
Never has a test match changed so dramatically in one hour of play as it did at the Adelaide Oval on Saturday. Worse yet, a collapse like this could affect performance in the next MCG Test Match, starting on December 26, and not forgetting that they will not have a Kohli to look up to, as he would be on paternity leave.
Promoted
Ajinkya Rahane, the waiting captain, has been in miserable shape for a long time and one would rather discount his hundred against a below-average West Indies attack in the meantime. Even South Africa’s attack at home was not the best in the business. Prithvi Shaw’s confidence is a disaster in terms of technique and temperament. Mayank Agarwal, with that pronounced back lift and unreliable technique against extra-bouncing calvings, will also have its share of problems.
Cheteshwar Pujara’s defensive hitting worked well in 2018, but this time, there is a propensity to get stuck as Shane Warne, during the comment, pointed out his inability to rotate the strike. As much as one romanticizes that 160-ball 43 as a pristine test cricket display, but that lack of runs in the first two sessions also came back to bite India. The sequence 4, 9, 2, 0, 4, 0, 8, 4, 0, 4 and 1 on the scorecard will irritate fans, but more this team, for longer.
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