New Delhi: The final Test of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy was wrapped inside the just three days with the hosts Australia turning to be the victorious team on Sunday. It was quite surprising given the fact that the last three India-Australia Test matches at the Sydney Cricket Ground had ended in a drawn affair, which means five days of play was in effect.
Well the additional layer of grass perhaps could have done the trick to force a result this time around, though too early. India’s abysmal record at the SCG in Tests continued with the team now suffering their sixth defeat at the venue in its 14th match. The only Test victory for India in Sydney came in 1978 when Erapalli Prasanna took eight wickets to help the team register an innings and two runs win.
This has been a really disappointing tour for the Asian side after winning their previous two Test tour in down under, and conceding the Australians the Border-Gavaskar Trophy after a period of 10 years. Such was the dominance of India against the best in the world.
The defeat might be a bit difficult to digest after how the tour started with a massive 295-run win in Perth under Jasprit Bumrah’s captaincy. Without any doubt a lot has went wrong thereafter. The noise over a transition period will be vouched for after the team managed to win just one of their last eight Test matches and squandered the initial grip at the top on the World Test Championship (WTC) standings.
Head coach Gautam Gambhir mentioned during the post-match press conference that it wasn’t just one department but collective downfall. Senior players didn’t hold the accountability while youngsters couldn’t plug in to live up on their talent.
There was batting rejig right after the Perth Test in order to accommodate regular captain Rohit Sharma. Rohit went to bat at the No.6 position, the one where he started in his nascent days of Test cricket. He didn’t disturbed the opening pair of Yashasvi Jaiswal and KL Rahul following their 201-run partnership in Perth.
When the Indian skipper couldn’t deliver in the middle order, he returned to open the innings with Jaiswal, meaning KL Rahul was pushed down at No.3 and it all came at the expense of dropping Shubman Gill from the team in the Boxing-Day Test in Melbourne. The move backfired after Rohit managed to score 3 and 9, adding to his appalling tally of 31 runs from five innings at 6.20.
The Indian captain dropped himself from the team in Sydney, admitting his lack of runs as the reason, a good decision but maybe too late. Another senior man Virat Kohli kicked off the tour with his 30th Test hundred in Perth, but then couldn’t ride on that momentum with 85 runs flowing in the next seven innings at an average of 12.14. Even Shubman Gill, who played a great hand in the famous Gabba win, only scored 93 runs in five innings at 18.60.
Perhaps the youngsters Yashasvi Jaiswal (391 at 43.44) and Nitish Kumar Reddy (298 at 37.25) performed decently on their maiden visit down under.
The bowling was single-handedly carried by Jasprit Bumrah throughout the series and his absence was aptly felt at the most crucial juncture of the series when India were required to defend 162 runs in Sydney. The back spasm injury didn’t permit him to bowl. He claimed 32 wickets at 13.06 with three five-wicket hauls on this tour.
Mohammed Siraj did support him till a certain extent with 20 wickets at 31.15. India lacked a third seamer with Mohammed Shami’s fitness concerns jeopardising their goal and Harshit Rana wasn’t the ideal replacement, though he bowled well in Perth but looked frail in Adelaide. Nitish Kumar Reddy wasn’t effective with the ball as he was with the bat, not delivering to the standards of Shardul Thakur or Hardik Pandya.
The team selection was a constant questioning on the tour with the two spin-bowling all-rounders played in the last two Tests, but didn’t get much bowling period in Sydney. Sundar bowled just one over, and that too when the game was away from India’s hold. Many pundits raised question over the timing of Ravichandran Ashwin’s retirement as his spin-bowling could be handy in Melbourne and Sydney.
There are questions of plenty for head coach Gautam Gambhir to address and they have six months in store before their next Test series against England in June to start the next cycle. For the players running out of form, they can return to domestic cricket and get into the groove, as pointed by Gambhir in the press conference.
This has been a really disappointing tour for India after winning their previous two Test tour in down under, and conceding the Australians the Border-Gavaskar Trophy after a period of 10 years. Such was the dominance of India against the best in the world. Cricket Sports News: Latest Cricket News, Cricket Live Score, Sports Breaking News from Sports Today
