It took only five balls to wrap up the Australian innings early on Day 2. R Ashwin doing the honours as he got Mitchell Starc to slog sweep one at deep midwicket. Australia finished with 260 on the board and it was up to the Indian batsmen to put up a healthy score. India did get off to a steady start but some fine spells of fast bowling from the Starc-Hazlewood duo pushed India on the backfoot. Hazlewood kept it tight getting M Vijay out caught behind while Starc snared pace and bounce to watch the backs of Cheteshwar Pujara and Virat Kohli. What followed was a collapse. India succumbed to Steve O’Keefe’s spin and lost seven wickets for eleven runs. It was all but over as India ended up with just 105 handing a healthy lead of 155 to Australia. Head Coach Anil Kumble agreed it was a bad day on the field.
“You are bound to have one bad day. It was disappointing. We were in a pretty decent position when Rahul and Ajinkya were batting out there. But once Rahul got out, we lost those four wickets in five or six balls. That certainty pushed us back,” he said asking for more restraint from his batsmen. “We had a couple of soft dismissals. And this pitch was certainly challenging, so we needed a lot more restraint and showed that if you put your head down, you could make those runs. It was unfortunate that once Rahul got out, we seemed to lose the bearing at that point of time.”
Rahul did get to a fine half century not until he played a shot that had him wincing in pain soon. Kumble agreed it could have been one of the changing points of the game. “In hindsight, yes. You need to play your shots on this type of wicket. You can’t really blame the batsman. In hindsight, probably he could have held back. Once Rahul and Ajinkya had that partnership of 50, that’s when we could have consolidated and probably got closer to the target or probably even got a lead. After that wicket, that was the start of things to happen. It was unfortunate we had a poor day. The lower order has contributed to us exceptionally in the past and today was not our day.”
Throwing light on Rahul’s injury, Kumble said, “He hurt his shoulder a little bit. He came off a little bit while he was batting. So we had to take care; this is more a precaution. He is ok now. He was back in the field for the last couple of overs. Tomorrow we have to see how he responds. Usually these kind of injuries take 24 hours before it resurfaces. So, we are hoping he will be fine.”
Kumble believed Australia’s star with the ball Steve O’Keefe was rewarded for his disciplined lines and lengths. He was also of the view that it was a testing pitch for the batsmen and it needed adaptability and application which the Indian batsmen lacked today. What hurt even more were the dropped chances. Steve Smith was dropped thrice and that could well be hurting India’s chances in the game.
“We dropped a few catches. It has hurt us in the past, especially in this game you need to hold your chances even if half chances. We dropped Steve Smith on couple of occasions, that has certainly pushed us back. Hopefully tomorrow morning we can pick up a few early wickets and then put the pressure back on them. I still feel there’s a lot of cricket to be played in this Test match. Tomorrow is another day.”
