Australia suffered an early setback in their chase of 76 but got there in the end without breaking much of a sweat to pull one back in the Border-Gavaskar Trophy against India. Marnus Labuschagne and Travis Head launched a counter-attack of sorts as Australia beat India by nine wickets at Indore for another three-day finish to become the first team to reach the World Test Championship final. Australia needed to avoid a 0-4 whitewash to secure their place in the WTC final – even a draw Test would have done the trick for team – but against all the odds and wild predictions, they served India an eye opener prolonging their wait for a ticket to England.
India needed a miracle to do the unthinkable. They had dismissed Australia for 91 in the first Test at Indore, but needed a better effort to pull a rabbit out of the hat. But today wasn’t the day. Even though Ravichandran Ashwin gave India the perfect start, getting rid of first innings half-centurion Usman Khawaja in the second ball of the day, nothing worked in their favour from there on. Head, who was surprisingly left out of the first Test grabbed the Indian attack by the scruff of their neck and slammed an unbeaten 49 off 53 balls.
Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja did succeed in troubling Head and Labuschagne in the first half an hour – they were 13/0 after the first 10 overs – but as soon as the ball was changed after some damage to its seam – Australia found a fresh lease of life. Head, in a span of 20 balls, struck five fours and one six to put make the result of this match a foregone conclusion. Labuschagne struck a four to hit the winning runs and allow Australia to give one back to India when not many expected them to after defeats in Nagpur and Delhi.
Steve Smith’s return to captaincy – albeit temporarily – couldn’t have worked any better. Australia set the tempo from the first ball on Day 1 itself. Despite losing the toss – the only thing that went against them – they restricted India for just 109 in their first innings. Losing seven wickets in the first session after opting to bat is where it began to go wrong, and although India found their mojo back early on Day 2, picking up 6 wickets for 11 runs, it couldn’t mask their collective failure as a batting unit.
If Matthew Kuhnemann was the their star in the first innings picking up a maiden five-wicket-haul, the legend of Nathan Lyon grew in the second as he rocked India with another five-wicket-haul, dismissing them for 163. Although Cheteshwar Pujara fought a lone and dogged battle scoring a gritty half-century, the Indian top order was left licking its wounds. In the end, Australia were left with less than a 100 to get, which they did in style.
“I just tried to take it one step a time. We have seen it throughout the series that with the wickets, the quality of bowling, anything can happen. So we were just trying to take it one ball at a time. It’s just nice to contribute. Make sure to go out and execute in the first innings. In the lead up to the test series, we had to make sure to be clear in our plans. We had to make some changes, but I think we’ve done a fantastic job to come back after being under pressure in the first two games,” Head said after the match.
“We knew it wasn’t going to be clean sailing. There were going to be times when India were going to be on top, times when we could get the runs. It was important that we just kept a calm head. There was no message coming from the top. Unbelievable. He does what he does. He has the most wickets in the subcontinent for an Australian bowler. Long may he continue.”
